Encouraging Small Business Development in Northeast Connecticut

If you build it, they will come but how will they know it is there?

The Northeast Connecticut region, known as the "Quiet Corner", has excellent access from Interstate 395 but is one of two interstates in Connecticut that fails to have a welcome center near its state border.

While John Filchak, Executive Director of Northeast CT Council of Governments (NECOG), has said the group purchased a 13.6 acre parcel of property in Thompson near Exit 100 for a possible future visitor center, its possible the Quiet Corner will be rejected once again by state officials.

In the report "Benchmarking Connecticut's Rest Areas, Service Plazas, and Welcome Centers" created in 2006 by Earth Tech, Inc., several possible sites were identified as locations for welcome centers.

The study concluded that the Average Daily Traffic count in Thompson is 20,700 which they conclude is "well below the volumes served by any of the other Connecticut centers" and that "inclusion of a welcome center along the corridor should be considered in the context of larger state tourism goals and opportunities."

What are these opportunities one might ask? These include Interstate 91 southbound on the Connecticut /Massachusetts state line in Enfield, where two-way traffic is over 73,900 and the report hints at a possible additional center along Interstate 95 near Waterford.

This leaves NECOG with owning a piece of property where a visitor center looks to be much more like a dream than a reality.

The need for a welcome center has been a concern for quite a while, especially one to provide informational brochures about Connecticut's best kept secrets.
It seems these days larger attractions in the state have no problems with advertising but those attractions owned by small historical societies, independently-owned restaurants and shops, and those places in Connecticut's smallest towns have little finances for advertising.