Middletown, Conn. 1965 Transportation Plan

[kurumi]

The city of Middletown has placed much of its 1965 POD and a small part of its 1975 POD online. The 1965 Circulation Plan has some fun ideas that never got implemented:

• Acheson Drive section of CT 9 => 6-lane freeway
• Two new interchanges on CT 9 to serve Middletown Central Business District (CBD)
• CT 66 (US 6A) freeway crossing the river on a new bridge just southeast of the CBD (in vogue at the time: bring freeway traffic close to the city center)
• Complete 66/9 interchange with 4 left exits
• Ring road around CBD; 4 lanes divided arterial; would use existing CT 17 freeway, including diamond interchange with old CT 9
• 4-lane divided arterial from CBD to I-91 exit 20 (Country Club Rd), with some grade separations
• Northwest extension of Randolph Rd (CT 155) to meet the above connector; this would also be 4 lanes
• Washington Street (today's CT 66) becomes tree-lined boulevard

Are there maps? Yes there are. The overview maps at town level show the city's proposed CT 66 freeway alignment.

• Western overview
• Eastern overview
• Drawing of CBD, including 66/9 interchange, ring road, CT 9 interchanges. I love this drawing.

By 1968, however, the Middlesex Bridge and Port Authority was proposing a new Connecticut River bridge further downstream.

More recently, the Middletown Area River Crossing Study (pdf) includes a few alternative locations, north and south of Middletown CBD.

[shadyjay]

Nice find.  And to think almost 50 years later, we still have made no improvements.  Route 9 is still a boulevard.  The only crossing of the river is a 1930s era bridge with 2 narrow lanes each way and sharp curves at one end (complete with near-original lighting on the curve). 

I used to live in Middletown.  It was a descent place to live, but the traffic on 66 & 9 made it quite the challenge to get from one end of town to the other.  Now I live in Vermont and enjoy relatively quiet roads with few delays.  My friend who still lives in Middletown (on both ends) texted me over the July 4th weekend about how Route 9 SB was backed up all the way to I-91, presumably with a large portion of beach traffic. 

I've devised my own plan to alleviate the Route 9 problem - send it to Portland.  You'd not only give Route 9 a free flowing route with no traffic lights (wow - what a concept) but you'd also lessen the load on the Arrigoni Bridge since traffic from points east of the river would hop on Route 9 and its two new river crossings.  Then, its just a question on how to improve the traffic flow from points west of the river to Route 9.  Maybe the Route 6A expressway wasn't such a bad idea!