Date: Sat 28-Mar-1998

Publication: Bee

Author: ANDYG

Quick Words:

Fairfield-Hills-Greenway

Full Text:

State To Convey Fairfield Hills "Greenway" To The Town

(w/ aerial photo and picture)

BY ANDREW GOROSKO

The state Office of Policy and Management (OPM) has agreed to give the town a

strip of land along Deep Brook at Fairfield Hills, providing a riverine

corridor suitable for passive recreation, State Rep Julia Wasserman said

Tuesday.

The 21.6-acre parcel is a strip of land situated along an unused railbed and

the ravine that carries Deep River across Fairfield Hills between the campus's

power plant and the confluence of Deep Brook and the Pootatuck River.

The corridor, which ranges in width from 100 to 150 feet, could serve as a

greenway or "linear park" for passive forms of recreation such as walking,

hiking and nature study, Mrs Wasserman said.

Land-conveyance legislation is being formulated to enact the transfer of land

from the state to the town, Mrs Wasserman said. Its passage is expected.

Town acceptance of the property would require endorsements from the Board of

Selectmen and Legislative Council.

The open-space corridor physically links the parcel that contains Watertown

Hall to the town's new sewage treatment plant.

Watertown Hall sits on a 22.6-acre plot that the state already has agreed to

give the town as a partial settlement of the lawsuit the town filed against

the state over the construction of Garner Correctional Institution, the

state's high-security prison on Nunnawauk Road that opened in 1992.

The state's planned transfer of the open-space corridor to the town is one

result of much land-use planning for Fairfield Hills during the past several

years, Mrs Wasserman said.

"The state is leaning over backwards" to provide the town with good access to

Fairfield Hills, she said.

The state closed the psychiatric institution in December 1955, after years of

reducing its activities there.

So far, the state legislature has dedicated 250 acres of state land at the

600-acre Fairfield Hills for land conservation, agriculture and open-space

use. Mrs Wasserman is seeking to have the state assign an additional 50 acres

of its land for similar use.

Mrs Wasserman was a member of the Fairfield Hills Task Force, an ad hoc group

that authored a 1994 report to the state on future uses of Fairfield Hills.

The group placed high emphasis on preserving open-space land and allowing

expanded recreational uses of the property.