Bob Godfrey

You may have heard that a long overdue federal infrastructure bill was signed by President Joe Biden recently and came in at $1.25 trillion. Connecticut, specifically, will receive a little over $1billion over the next five years to address issues including strengthening bridges, major road projects, buses and railroads, and extending broadband coverage around the state for all of us.



Danbury could benefit in ways. I'm certainly in favor of and will push for solutions to our long-time congestion problems on I-84. It simply needs to be widened between exits 3 and 8. When you add oncoming traffic in from Route 7 it can be a nightmare. The good news is that the State Bond Commission already approved $10 million for the design and engineering to widen I-84 between exits 3 and 8 in July. Now there could be funding for construction.

The long-considered proposal to re-electrify the Danbury Branch of Metro-North, and extend passenger service to Brookfield and New Milford is also a good move. I support it wholeheartedly because this could help alleviate our congestion issues on Route 7 among other things.

I’ve joined my western Connecticut colleagues, led by Representative Raghib Allie-Brennan and Representative Bill Buckbee, to channel some of the funding the state receives to the railroad. My grandfather, Edmund Godfrey, was an engineer, and ran trains under the wires from Danbury directly into Grand Central Station. It was faster. Check out this article from the Danbury News-Times.