Around Town

New Canaan Week in Review: ABC, C&C, ‘Bitz’ with a Z

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The week leading into Memorial Day weekend—and one of New Canaan’s most cherished annual events, the parade—brought a major change to what has emerged as a more recent community event, saw improbable, dramatic wins for our baseball and softball teams, and closed the loop on a closely followed storyline among townies. Here’s the Week in Review. Town talker

Caffeine & Carburetors has made big headlines since even before its 2014 debut in April, as this year marked the first that the grassroots car enthusiasts gathering expanded from Pine to Elm Street. Yet downtown neighbors, police, CERT volunteers and town officials could not realistically foresee continuing a 5,000-plus person event six times per year. A compromise was reached this week, with Caffeine & Carburetors to be held in New Canaan in April and September only.

Around Town

New Canaan Week in Review: Softball Victory, Restaurant Reopens, Real Estate Happenings

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New Canaan saw plenty of police activity in the week just passed—including from our Animal Control unit, whose calls have picked up considerably with the warmer weather. We also saw the nation’s youngest senator roll into town, and a SUV roll from Starbucks across Park Street, on a thankfully slow morning where nobody was hurt. The nice weather held on Saturday for the Food Revolution and Farmers Market downtown—and many of those attendees will know that The Farmer’s Table has reopened on Forest—and finished with a bang at the inaugural fundraiser for the Carriage Barn Arts Center. Here’s the week in review:

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In the most recent installment of our feature spotlighting local New Canaan history, we look behind what surely are familiar landmarks to motorists and residents in the area of Brushy Ridge. The stone arch and separate, Stonehenge-like structure are remnants of “The Rockery,” a once well-traversed, 19th Century estate on Brushy Ridge (52 acres) that was dubbed “Mount Lebanon” by locals for the influence brought by its Beirut-born creator.

Around Town

New Canaan Week in Review: Playing, Planting, Parking

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This week on NewCanaanite.com, we spotlighted public schools students past and present—including a pair of New Canaan High School varsity baseball coaches who had grown up here, playing the game together—while also giving nods to a rare example of widely appreciated new home construction and to a beloved community event that some feel marks the unofficial start of spring, the May Fair. Town Talker

Another major local event is the annual Christmas Eve caroling at God’s Acre. This week, we saw the town—thanks to some forward-thinking and community-oriented holiday party planning—plant a new fir tree that one day will serve as the centerpiece for that caroling. New Christmas Caroling Tree at God’s Acre
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This week’s most widely read article was a history of “The Rockery”—a largely vanished, 52-acre estate up on Brushy Ridge that was developed in the 19th Century by a Beirut-born physician who had come to settle in New Canaan—the traces of which can still be seen in the forms of a stone arch and Stonehenge-like structure familiar to many locals. Traffic

Just as parking officials in New Canaan put forward a largely new slate of fines for violators, concern arose surrounding space availability at the Locust Avenue lot as well as safety issues for pedestrians with double-parking delivery trucks at difficult intersections.

Around Town

New Canaan Week in Review: Oxygen, Lawn, Reflexology

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As we at NewCanaanite.com speed into our fourth month, classic and modern cars are motoring into town today—though soon enough, those vehicles and all others will pay $1 per hour to park at the end of Pine Street. Across town, residents on Parade Hill Road have petitioned town officials to address motorists (especially large-vehicle operators) that they say are traveling too quickly in their neighborhood—for many years a popular cut-thru between Routes 123 and 124 (Oenoke Ridge Road). Traffic in New Canaan and the commercial center of our town form a major piece of what made news this week. Town talker

An article disclosing plans for 21 Forest St.—for a 3-story mixed residential (seven units) and retail (two street-level spaces) complex—garnered conversation both on NewCanaanite.com and on our Facebook page. While some, including residents who hold permits, expressed justifiable concerns about parking in the Locust Avenue lot—already filling up too often and too quickly with construction vehicles for Town Hall and the firehouse—others lamented the loss of the old BMW Lindners Cycle Shop building on Forest.

Around Town

New Canaan Week in Review: Decisions, Decisions (and Proof of Spring)

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New Canaan’s leaders in many areas—including government, business, education, public safety and parks—are facing choices in how to proceed with capital and other projects facing the town. District officials face concerns from some parents about a practice run for new standardized testing on one end, while state officials from above are pushing for mandatory participation. Business and town officials are eager to see natural gas service offered to New Canaan homes, restaurants, shops and offices—yet facing with no clear plan, timetable or cost/benefit analysis in hand, they’re pushing the utility for more information. And while elected officials eye the future use of a structure on New Canaan Nature Center property that’s controlled by the town, public works and police say they’re trying to reason with a property owner on Main Street whose trees pose a sightline problem. Town Talker

A discussion at a meeting of town parks officials this month, about dogs at Bristow Bird Sanctuary, has led to a push to disallow canines from the public property at all.