As a community larger than many small Connecticut towns, UConn’s Storrs campus is constantly changing and updating to meet the needs of its academic mission, student and worker population, and infrastructure demands.

With that work often resulting in road construction, the University is starting a monthly update to inform students, faculty and staff about the status of significant projects and to help them anticipate changes in traffic and pedestrian patterns.

This is the first such update, which will serve as one of many resources that the University offers to provide pertinent information on these issues.

The University’s Office of Planning, Design, and Construction also posts many resources on its website to explain significant construction activity by semester, along with project updates and detailed quarterly construction status reports. Inn addition, the office keeps a running blog on its website with project updates, specifics about traffic impacts from construction, and other news.

Some news of note in March for drivers and pedestrians at UConn Storrs:

North Eagleville Road

Construction begins to ramp up again this month on this main thoroughfare, in preparation for resuming the next phase of a major multi-year project to replace water pipes, steam lines, and other underground infrastructure.

Did You Know?
UConn Storrs has 29 miles of water lines in the core of its campus alone – and that’s not counting the underground water lines elsewhere on campus.
It also doesn’t include the extensive network of sewer lines, telecommunications infrastructure, and steam lines that help the University heat its buildings, or other utilities chugging away under our feet every day.

University contractors faced delays last summer and fall as they worked on the eastern part of the road, where significant amounts of underground bedrock made it more difficult than expected to reach some of the piping. In many cases, maps also had not been updated during repairs over previous decades, and the pipes were not in their expected locations.

To prepare for the next phase of the project, crews will start excavating rock and working on steam line replacements as of Monday, March 5, on North Eagleville Road near the Torrey Life Sciences Building.

Alternating one-way traffic patterns will be in place during the work periods and parts of the sidewalk will be closed, but signs will be in place to help direct drivers and pedestrians.

To the west, utility installation work also begins Friday, March 2, on a different portion of North Eagleville Road near Auditorium Road. Police and/or construction flaggers will help direct traffic; it will remain two-way, but with changing patterns depending on when and where crews are working in each phase.

The roads will be repaved, the landscaping will be restored, and other work will be done before Commencement in May 2018, which brings large numbers of vehicles to campus, many of which use North Eagleville.

After graduation, the project will ramp up again on a larger scale, with traffic limited to one-way eastbound between Discovery Drive and Glenbrook Road. The portion between Glenbrook Road and Route 195 will remain open in its current two-way traffic pattern, however.

Jim Calhoun Way

This road, which connects to Hillside Road near Gampel Pavilion and the UConn Bookstore, returns to two-way traffic Friday, March 2. The University implemented temporary changes last month to address challenges in that heavily traveled area.

Although the road is reverting to its earlier traffic pattern, UConn Police advise drivers and pedestrians to continue to watch for each other and use caution, particularly at the Hillside Road intersection. A line of west-facing Area 1 parking spaces that previously existed on Jim Calhoun Way next to Gampel also will be restored.

Also on Jim Calhoun Way, construction crews need to excavate test pits on a small portion of the road by Gampel to identify existing utilities as part of planning for summer infrastructure work. That test pit construction is expected to start March 20 or later, weather permitting, and to run for about five days.

A temporary fence will be put up around the perimeter of the work and police will direct cars on alternating traffic patterns, but drivers and pedestrians are asked to be particularly careful in that area. The portions of the road where the test pits are excavated will be filled, repaved, and re-striped as the final work in completing the short but necessary project.

Also of Note

• Auditorium Road and Auditorium Road Extension will be closed to traffic during the nearby North Eagleville project this month and also during the summer work, with only construction and service vehicles allowed to use it.
• Jorgensen Road is open to local traffic only, with no through-traffic allowed. However, a drop-off area is regularly set aside there during Jorgensen events for people with accessibility and mobility issues.