By Aliza Alperin-Sheriff
Mercerville businesses want barriers installed along Nottingham Way
Booktrader of Hamilton’s owner Joan Silvestro sat near the front of her store, working at her laptop. Oct. 27 had been a quiet day at the store, and Silvestro was the only person inside. Suddenly, around 2:30 p.m., she heard a loud bang and felt pebbles hitting her face. She turned around to find a car halfway inside her store. She was surrounded by debris.
The car that hit Booktrader, a 1992 Toyota 4Runner, had been heading east on Nottingham Way. A 2002 Toyota Camry was heading west, didn’t see the Forerunner because of a bend in the road and made a left turn in front of it. The two cars bumped, and the driver of the 4Runner lost control and swerved to the right toward the sidewalk. Still out of control, the car continued into Booktrader until it hit a steel beam with enough force that it spun around and out onto the curb where it finally came to a halt after getting stuck on top of a small planter that prevented it from continuing back out into the street.
The crash took out the door and some of the windows. It left the print of a tire tread on the building’s façade and a ball joint embedded in the wall. There was also a great deal of damage inside the shop. The wreck destroyed 3,419 used books, 30 new books and other merchandise including T-shirts, gift mugs, cards and bookmarks.
Booktrader of Hamilton is not the only store on its block to have experienced a car crash in recent years. Big John’s Barber Shop and Carella’s Chocolates and Gifts have also both had crashes. Accordingly, the store owners on the block have decided to come together to take a stand.
Connie Dalton, the owner of Carella’s Chocolates and Gifts, offered her opinion on the reason why the block seems to be such a magnet for accidents.
“This road has a bend in it when you come to where our businesses are,” she said. “If you’re speeding, or drank too much, or are a young driver, or even a good driver, when you hit that bend—and then Grayson Avenue is right there—it’s a very dangerous spot.”
Dalton said that she has been working on finding a way to make the road safer since 2007. She said that has been in contact with both the township and the New Jersey Department of Transportation. In the past, local business owners have asked the township to lower the speed limit on Nottingham Way.
“The problem is that Hamilton Township always goes back to the fact that it’s a state road, so we have to get NJDOT involved, which we would like to do,” Dalton said. “But in the meantime what we’re trying to do is get some large cement security planters and cement pylons.”
Dalton pointed to Route 33 along Robbinsville’s Town Center as an example of place that has the type of security measures that she would like to see on Nottingham Way, but she couldn’t think of anywhere similar in Hamilton.
Dalton, Silvestro and other business owners on the block had a meeting set with Mayor Kelly Yaede near the end of November. Silvestro also started a petition demanding some sort of safety measure be implemented, which she hopes that the other business owners on the block will put out as well.
Silvestro said that changes need to be made because the accident could have been a lot worse.
“The businesses are all covered,” she said. “Our insurance covers this. But if someone had been walking on the sidewalk, if someone had been at the ATM, it would have been a lot worse than what it was.
“Little kids come here to read—that’s the scary part for me,” she added. “I had a big bin of children’s board books in the store. On most days, there would be a little kid or grandmother or mom in front of the bin digging through the board books. It was right near where the bulk of the damage happened. All the debris fell right there.”
At first, Silvestro and her husband tried to inspect the books to see if some of them could be salvaged, but the insurance adjuster told them not to bother. Everything exposed to glass had to be thrown away, Silvestro said.
Silvestro said that cleaning up the store was a mess. Although the store is normally closed on Tuesday and Wednesday, it had to stay closed on Thursday and Friday as well. The building parts that had ended up inside the store were removed on Monday night. Then, Silvestro and her husband had to count all of the destroyed books for insurance purposes. Once they finished, everything had to be boxed up and taken away. Next, professional cleaners had to come in and check the shelving near the front of the store to make sure that there was no more debris and then wipe down the store and wash the floor because of the haze of dust from the impact.
Silvestro isn’t sure yet how long the construction to fix the front of the store will take, but she hopes that it won’t further impact her business. She especially hopes that the store will be able to remain open closer to the holidays.
However, Silvestro also sees a potential silver lining to having to reconstruct the front of the store.
“The long windows we had didn’t give a lot of light. People can’t tell from outside that we’re a bookstore. The contractor seemed to feel that we could put in store display windows instead for the same amount of money,” she said.
Despite the extensive damage, not one person was hurt in the crash. Silvestro believes she made it through completely unscathed because she was “wrapped in angels’ wings.”
She explained that when she was a little girl, her father had a medal with a dove on it that symbolized the Holy Spirit, and when she and her siblings made first communion, they got their own necklaces or medals with the same dove.
She also explained that she has a regular customer who often brings her little trinkets. The Saturday after the crash, which was the day the store reopened, the customer, who didn’t know anything about the crash or the importance of the dove symbol to Silvestro, brought her a small wood angel with the pendant of a dove hanging from it.
“It was a sign,” Silvestro said, “I had been saying all week that I was wrapped in angels’ wings. This was just visual proof.”
,
