Three Impediments To Millstone Bypass##M:[more]##
In its plans to redevelop the Princeton Junction area, West Windsor clings to the concept of a road through the Sarnoff property along the Millstone River.
This is the same roadway that the state Department of Transportation rejected. After over two years of research and public input for the Penns Neck Area Environmental Impact Statement, the DOT determined that the environmental, archaeological, and historic impacts of the road far outweighed the minimal traffic abatement the road might offer.
While the EIS concludes only that the road cannot be built with federal funds, one would be unwise to assume that the path is clear for West Windsor to build the road. Many of the same impediments that stopped the DOT remain to confound West Windsor and Sarnoff.
First, there is now documented evidence for nesting New Jersey-threatened owls, as well as evidence of an endangered fish and mussel (see the Final EIS Executive Summary and Appendices). The state Department of Environmental Protection required the DOT to study the area further; it will require West Windsor to do the same. Since the release of the EIS, bald eagles have been documented to be nesting and breeding along Lake Carnegie. The Millstone River along Sarnoff’s property is well within the bald eagle’s foraging range, and any damage done to the river could impact the endangered bird’s feeding and nesting habitat.
Second, West Windsor and Sarnoff would have to contend with the removal of toxic waste generated by Sarnoff years ago. Both are willing, unfortunately, to let the toxins remain where they are now, but should they decide to build a road, both would be saddled with cleanup costs and the potential to release the toxins into the region’s drinking water.
The third impediment to construction of a road through Sarnoff is financial. With the consideration of the Millstone Bypass was the opportunity for the DOT and the Federal Highway Administration to give West Windsor and Sarnoff a free road. Now that both agencies have panned the idea, West Windsor and Sarnoff must foot the bill. Environmental and public-health reasons aside, it is the cost of the road that will be the largest deterrent to the resurrection of the Millstone Bypass.
The Sierra Club strongly favors redevelopment over new development, as long as such construction is not harmful to the environment or to public health. West Windsor’s plan to revitalize the Princeton Junction train station area could result in a more environmentally friendly way of life for its residents. But to destroy the Millstone River and its banks in the process is just plain wrong.
The Sierra Club, along with other community groups, spent several years working on the EIS. We agreed upon a solution that, while not perfect, was acceptable to everyone. Should West Windsor attempt to revive the stretch of road that caused so much commotion a few years ago, the Sierra Club and its allies will be ready once again to oppose it. Laura Lynch
Conservation Chair, NJ Chapter, Sierra Club
Transit Villages & Local Control
The Northeast Corridor Rail Line represents millions of dollars of investment of federal and state taxpayers’ money. Yet access to this significant piece of our public transit system is controlled by the local officials who have jurisdiction over the land and streets around each station.
The issue of local control comes up in suburban station areas where it makes sense to use the infrastructure and the land more efficiently by redeveloping the surface parking lots into Transit Villages. Transit Villages are compact, amenity-rich, mixed-use centers designed to increase the use of transit as well as increase the benefits from the use of land.
Although the idea of Transit Villages is generally popular, it becomes locally controversial when a specific proposal is made that will change a particular neighborhood. These local issues have been well reported in the press, but there has been little analysis as to what the broader, statewide, or regional interests may be in the redevelopment.
The interstate function of the Northeast Corridor Line is clear – this Boston to Washington line is the most heavily traveled in the country. People find it an efficient way to get to cities where cars are a liability, and those cities are well served allowing more people to have access to this line.
The same is true statewide: there is great demand for access to New Jersey Transit’s service on this line. They have been trying to accommodate that demand by adding development around existing stations and adding a new station in the region between New Brunswick and Princeton Junction. Each proposal has faced local opposition.
Regionally, planners want to get as many people onto trains, buses or shuttles, who would otherwise be driving on Route 1 or local roads, which cannot accommodate the demand. Whether or not there are transportation options for these people has regional economic and environmental impacts.
Opposition to Transit Villages is usually expressed in terms of worries about the cost of school children from housing and about the increase in congestion from added development. But the facts gleaned from the study of Transit Villages paint a different picture.
First, studies show that housing around stations attracts empty nesters and young adults. There are so many studies that show this, that Rutgers’ school population calculator that is applied to development is being updated to reflect these facts.
Second, there are studies that demonstrate that if new development were centered in compact, mixed-use centers at transit hubs, the growth in highway traffic congestion could be significantly reduced. Reductions could be as high as 60 percent, as shown in one study done for the Route 1 Corridor in 1991 by the Regional Planning Partnership.
One way to address the controversy over density is for local governments to apply Transfer of Development Rights (TDR). TDR allows the development rights from farmland and other open space, which is inappropriate for development, to be transferred into places like train station areas that can use the higher density to function better. Shifting density does not increase the overall amount of development in the town, gives landowners a return on their land, and can reduce auto-dependency and sprawl.
Another way to reduce controversy is to widen the discussion. Transit Villages as seen from a regional point of view can balance the local view and regional planning can help ensure good results.
First, looking at transit as a regional system can help officials to see the role their local station plays in the functioning of the transportation system today and how that role may change in the future.
Second, regional planning can establish regional growth targets for new jobs and housing in locations that will improve the region’s prospects for a better quality of life in the future. Transit Villages can increase housing as well as transportation choice — something lacking in suburban areas. Adding density and a mix of use at local stations will result in a decrease in density and development in other parts of the municipality.
Finally, regional planning for Transit Villages can integrate the land use and transportation aspects of growth. As we grow, we can get a better functioning transportation system instead of increasing congestion.
Local controversy is almost always about the density of development that is proposed around the station, but it is the density that makes transit work.
Redevelopment of a train station adds value to the existing neighborhoods: property values go up. If the interests of the regional economy and the environment were considered in the local discussion, it would be more likely that a decision will be made in which all levels of interest will benefit. Dianne Brake
President, Regional Planning Partnership
Bigger School Budget Guarantees Higher Taxes, But Not Better Schools
That Princeton Regional, West Windsor-Plainsboro, and Montgomery escaped recent elections with school budgets intact, given the 15.7 percent voter turnout, reflects the dismal fact that many residents view voting as an exercise in futility. Those upset over steadily rising property taxes are frustrated as their efforts to hold the line on budget increases regularly fail; budgets always increase, as do property taxes along with them.
Taxpayer anger is rightfully directed at property taxes because even in those rare instances when a budget is rejected, its review nullifies the rejection, given the minuscule reduction made by the municipality, which clearly demonstrates the futility of voting. Why is there surprise at the low turnout?
Advocates of increased budgets, however, are pleased with the outcome no matter the turnout, even though they must know that increased budgets do not guarantee continued increases in student achievement — a fact demonstrated time and again around the country. But increased school budgets do adversely affect family budgets.
New Jersey is among the top three states in property-tax levels far outstripping incomes, especially among those living on fixed incomes and the miserable stock market returns of the past four years.
Adding additional insult, property taxes in West Windsor could rise by 30-plus percent in 2007 (yes, that’s correct) as a consequence of property revaluations. And the recent school budget increase will add additional taxes on top of that.
The sad fact is that property taxes are rising much too rapidly and reaching astronomic levels. But increasing property values are meaningless for many homeowners who have not planned on moving. The fact of increasing value does not translate to money in the bank. In fact, there is a real possibility that these unconscionable property-tax increases will force many people to move, flooding the market with homes for sale.
Changing elections from April to November, and eliminating direct election of school budgets, will not solve the contentious issue of property taxes now ranging into the tens of thousands of dollars per household. What ever happened to the common good? And it was not that long ago that Senator Jon Corzine, the Democratic candidate for governor of New Jersey, had as his major campaign platform property-tax reduction. What ever happened to that?
Melvin A. Benarde
Thorngate Court, West Windsor
Rabid Raccoon Prompts Warning
While rabies became an established part of New Jersey’s wildlife during the 1990s, few cases have been documented in recent years. However, that changed recently when a rabid raccoon was diagnosed in West Windsor.
Rabies is caused by a virus that can affect all warm-blooded animals, including dogs, cats, and humans. The disease is spread through direct contact with an infected animal’s saliva, traveling along the body’s nerve fibers. Rabies can cause death if not treated immediately. Current therapy consists of six, relatively painless shots usually given in the upper arm.
In addition to bats, wild animals with a high risk include raccoons, foxes, and skunks. Domestic pets, too, can become infected — since 1981, the incidence of cat rabies has exceeded that of dogs. Cats are at an increased risk for rabies because of their nocturnal hunting habits. For rabies control, I offer the following suggestions:
1. Never feed, handle or keep any wild animals as pets. Don’t try to “save” or take home a baby wild animal.
2. Protect your pets: have both dogs and cats vaccinated. Call your local health departments for their next FREE rabies clinic.
3. Protect your pet from wild or stray animals: observe animal control regulations. Don’t let your pet run loose. Report all stray animals to the Animal Control Officer.
4. You cannot always tell if an animal has rabies just by looking at it — most must be tested to be certain. However, beware of animals that act strangely (walking in circles, stumbling or drooling); nocturnal (nighttime) animals out during the day; and wild animals that act overly friendly.
5. If a person or pet is bitten by a wild animal, report the incident to the Health Department. Try to catch or isolate the animal as most will need to be tested. If the bite is from a pet, contact the owner and get the animal’s vaccination history from their license.
6. All bite wounds should be cleaned immediately with soap and water. Contact a doctor at once.
Have your pets, including cats, vaccinated. For more information, call the Health Department at 609-799-2400. Robert Hary
Health Officer, West Windsor
To the editor:
President Bush continues reserving the option of nuking Iran’s underground installations in order to heal the Iranians of their ambitions to develop nuclear energy. His obsession with destroying bunkered facilities makes sense. They’re the only place on earth U.S. weaponry can’t reach. But unless the U.S. military possesses a secret nuclear bunker-buster in defiance of recognized laws of physics, known munitions and their delivery modes cannot reach and destroy deep earth installations such as Iran’s Natanz.
But regardless, would the resulting nuclear fallout of such an attack on Iran mean nothing to President Bush? Civilian headscarves offer scant protection from a toxic surging cloud sweeping like a dust storm along Iran’s urban areas.
Maybe the president’s foreign policy consiglieri, including the silken-tongued Condi Rice, can convince the man who will give the order that fallout is what occasionally happens between him and the first lady — the only downside for Iranians being bearded guys and dolls sleeping in separate beds a few nights. But to skin-burned Iranians, fallout will smart like a super-coiled smack in the face. Just one junior-sized Robust Nuclear Earth Penetrator popped 15 yards below ground throws millions of cubic yards of radioactive dirt. Is that the effect the White House theorizes will bring Iranian masses to revolt against their mullah leadership after being shaken and baked by the United States?
According to U.S. civilian war planners, Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad will become public enemy No. 1 to freedom-seeking Iranians. But in salons where they don’t drink the rose-colored Kool Aid drunk at the White House, it’s pie in the sky.
Or could the point of the “Iran Liberation” logic just be clever psychological warfare intended to bully the madman into submission — just like the “madman” Saddam. We-can-destroy-you rhetoric however doesn’t seem to be sending Mahmoud What’s-his-name into a spider hole. Perhaps the sieve-like U.S. intelligence services generously embedded with Russian and Chinese assets keep the Iranian leadership sumptuously apprised of the real U.S. algorithm.
Does the Bush White House not take pause from their endless patchwork maneuverings to control Iraq and Central Asia, and wonder if ordering a sure-to-fail, illegal act of aggression against Iran will be fully supported by the U.S. military? Does the White House ignore that such an order would be met with elements of mutiny? Does the president reside on earth or hover an inch above?
Those Persians will surely get hot and bothered being nuked by the U.S., but it’s tortured logic to think Iranians thus liberated will turn against their own. After all, the Bush White House might recall they continued digging a tomb for America in Iraq in 2004, yet Americans re-elected them.
Luis de Agustin
Gates Court
West Windsor
