u/ruthless_apricot

Note the construction of the new "Burlington" Apartments (74 Broad St) vs Coastline down the street

We have two new prominent apartment buildings going up downtown right now, the new currently unnamed midrise building on the site of the Burlington Coast factory on corner of Summer/Broad and the highrise building down the street on Gay/Broad called "The Coastline".

Take a look at the two buildings mid construction when you get a chance and look at how different they are. And yes, while Coastline is definitely will be a much bigger building than Burlington, it is clear that one uses a superior construction technique to the other.

"Burlington" is the standard heavily cost-engineered all-wood construction that we saw at The Asher down the street (it is built by the same company). Get ready to hear your upstairs neighbor's footsteps all day, deal with mosiure issues and potentially increased fire risks.

"The Coastline" is clearly a far more substantial building with a massive concrete footing and steel framing for the floors above. I am confident that this building will be better to live in than Burlington and have less noise transmisison between units as the structure is much sturdier.

Ultimately these two buildings will probably rent for a similar price tag, so I think it's important for people to know what the buildings are like inside before signing a lease.

reddit.com
u/ruthless_apricot — 4 days ago

Stanley closing New Britain, CT plant that made tape measures – because its foreign model is more popular

Some Powerlock, FatMax and Craftsman tape measure models were assembled at the factory. Now is the time to get one if you’d like to own a piece of CT history.

independent.co.uk
u/ruthless_apricot — 11 days ago

Plug-in solar panels just got approved by the CT Senate!

House Bill 5340 just got approved (pending final signoff by Gov Lamont) and the part which allows plug-in solar is honestly quite a big deal for regular CT property in Stamford and beyond.

This bill will allow homeowners to get up to 1200W of solar panels and install them using a DIY method where you "plug in" the inverter from the solar panels into a regular outdoor outlet in your property. No permits, no waiting for Eversource, no special meter, no complex and expensive install requiring and electrician - just a put the panels somewhere sunny, plug them in to an existing outlet and you're done. This works for both homewoners and apartment renters with a balcony, if you have somewhere sunny to put some panels you can do this.

The maximum allowed 1200W of solar panels and the inverters costs about ~$2500 and AI thinks a 1200W setup in CT will generate around 1,400 kWh/year (accounting for our low-sun winters). With our $0.35 kWh electricity prices (after delivery and fees) that means around $500 per year savings from this small setup. So the system should pay for itself in 5 years, which is extremely fast for solar.

Best of all, the cost to do this is small enough that people will buy the panels outright and not be trapped into predatory solar leasing schemes. 1200W of panels is usually 4 normal size panels - the perfect size to put on the roof of a garden pergola! Why not have some nice shade for your patio in the summer with solar that saves you money all year round? I truly believe this bill will get more people into solar and save CT residents money.

Article: https://www.ctinsider.com/politics/article/ct-solar-bill-senate-lamont-pura-electric-bills-22232629.php

The bill: https://www.cga.ct.gov/asp/cgabillstatus/cgabillstatus.asp?selBillType=Bill&bill_num=HB05340&which_year=2026

u/ruthless_apricot — 14 days ago