Residents in one Glastonbury neighborhood hope their persistence pays off in their quest to put a sidewalk on their street.
The concrete stops and starts along Neipsic Road. Neighbors say it’s hard to walk or run in the street without worrying about the vehicle traffic on that road.
“I have to drive up downtown or up over in East Glastonbury to go for a walk because I’m afraid to get hit by a car,” explained Thomas Schreindorfer.
Schreindorfer said he’s complained about the lack of sidewalks on his street since he moved in a decade ago.
His neighbor has started a petition to put sidewalks in just over a half mile of Neipsic Road from Karen Lee Road to Wickham Road, areas where the street’s sidewalks end.
“Most people here walk on the grass, you know. It’s not safe,” Schreindorfer said.
There are 10 criteria the town looks at for projects like this, including access to a school, heavy pedestrian use, access to parks and other public facilities, and a high traffic area. Town Manager Richard Johnson considers Neipsic Road a high priority project because a sidewalk would give people better access to schools and a park. It's also a high traffic area.
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“It is a high priority but there’s a few others that are equally as highly rated,” said Johnson.
In fact, Johnson said there are 50 other projects in the queue for the council to consider and usually only $200,000 to $300,000 allocated to the town’s sidewalks each year. The Neipsic Road sidewalk carries an estimated price tag of $290,000.
“What we try to do is look at how much money can reasonably be made available to us and what’s the biggest bang for the buck we can get,” Johnson said.
This year, the town is working on a $1 million project to connect Main Street to South Glastonbury.
“They have plenty of sidewalks there. I don’t have any,” said Schreindorfer.
Michelle Bowden has lived in her home on narrow Neipsic Road for almost 30 years, but she’s not too concerned about not having a sidewalk.
“There’s lots of things that we really need to pay for in town like people who need help with food and fuel and school upgrades.”
Bowden says she’s more concerned with the safety of her street.
“The police are always out here monitoring the speed because come down that hill at like 45-50 miles per hour,” said Bowden. “I think I would be worried about the safety of the people walking on the sidewalk because the road is so narrow and people tend to drive kind of fast.”
Glastonbury police said they regularly monitor the traffic in the area. With very few stop signs, Lt. Corey Davis said drivers tend to speed down Neipsic Road. However, he said there have not been any pedestrian accidents according to recent data. In the last six months, there have been two car accidents, both in November. One involved two vehicles at an intersection, and the other a car and a mailbox.
“I’m really afraid when I go out to get my mail because everybody’s trees sticking out and when I step out to get the mail I’m afraid because people come so fast and they’re really close to you,” said Bowden.
If the town council does approve the project, the earliest construction would start is the summer of 2020.
