Last year when the DOT closed the Route 1 left-hand jughandles at Washington Road and Harrison Street, residents of the Penns Neck area of West Windsor — whose neighborhood resembled a giant exit ramp during the closure — responded with letters of protest, demonstrations, and political lobbying. While they eventually succeeded in convincing the DOT to halt the experiment, the idea of traffic improvement along that section of Route 1 has not disappeared.
The DOT has now circulated a revised plan to effect a similar closing that it believes will not have the same adverse consequences. But this time the Penns Neck residents are not waiting to find out. They are actively circulating plans of their own that they believe will achieve a better solution for Route 1 as well as for West Windsor.
Plainsboro Committee discussed the proposal at its February 27 meeting and generally voiced support for the proposal (see story page 11). West Windsor held two public meetings on February 25 and 27, with most residents voicing skepticism.
Mayor Shing-Fu Hsueh and Township Engineer Francis Guzik both emphasized that the DOT proposal is just a concept; that it is nowhere hear being finalized, and that the money has not yet been allocated for this project. “Last year DOT said we could only expect $2 million from the state,” Hsueh said. “Now, because we have continued to make this a priority, the commissioner has said that he will do his best to earmark $33 to $40 million for the project.”
“In 1997 DOT had allocated $187 million for the project, at a time when the overpass alone was estimated to cost $50 million. They were willing to give us the money because of the proposed transit village. When that project wasn’t implemented, the DOT money went elsewhere. The commissioner has told me that we will never see that kind of money again. Now the overpass alone will cost $70 million, and DOT doesn’t have that much money to give us. They are trying to come up with an alternative and are asking for our input.”
The DOT proposal seeks to do away with the traffic light at Fisher Place; expand the jughandle at Washington Road; add a traffic light and egress/exit lanes at a site between Fisher Place and Harrison Street, and limit access from the Stanford Research Institute (SRI, formerly Sarnoff) property to Harrison Street. Though it is not apparent from the DOT’s rendering, Hsueh said, Princeton University has indicated that it would allow the DOT to use a portion of its land along Route 1 to build a roadway connecting Harrison Street with Route 1 beyond the current intersection.
“Because Princeton is willing to do this, we might be able to have DOT move the new proposed intersection further north on Route 1,” Hsueh said, adding that “if SRI wants to develop any more of their property, under the Municipal Master Plan, they are required to build a roadway from Vaughn Drive all the way to Route 1 — the ‘Millstone bypass.’ If we can convince SRI and DOT to do this, this will solve most of our problems.”
“I would like this to be a phased-in project,” Hsueh said.
Numerous residents attended the West Windsor meetings and many had questions or concerns, particularly residents of Penns Neck, including Eric Payne, who has lived in Penns Neck for the past three years in a home owned by his family for more than 100 years. “The house was first owned by my great-grandfather, who was the head groundskeeper at Princeton University; and then my grandfather, who graduated from the University and then worked there. My grandparents converted the home into a two-family dwelling, and moved upstairs to raise my father, who became an airline pilot. I followed him and became a pilot myself, although now I am a real estate agent. Many of my family members are buried in the Penns Neck cemetery. We have lived in Penns Neck since the 1800s,” Payne said.
Though Payne only moved in recently, he was a frequent visitor to the family’s home. He moved back because “this is a great area, and I wanted to live in this area again. I want to raise children here, but am afraid that the traffic situation has made it too dangerous. There were 10 accidents in Penns Neck as a result of the DOT pilot program; three of which occurred in front of my house. This current DOT plan is virtually the same idea as the pilot program. If this DOT plan is implemented, I might move out. All of my family has already moved away because of the traffic on Washington Road in Penns Neck.”
Payne is not just a disgruntled resident; he has become an activist. Payne was instrumental in helping to convince the DOT to end its their no-left-turn pilot program a month early. He started a petition, organized letter-writing campaigns to State and local officials, led a peaceful demonstration protesting the project, and worked with Mayor Hsueh and the administration to convince DOT to stop the project.
“I studied airport planning and design at Florida Institute of Technology, where I received my B.S. in aviation management. We worked with computer programs and simulations very similar to the programs used by NJDOT in regard to traffic flow. Not only did we determine traffic flow for pedestrian and vehicle traffic flow in and around large airports via highways, we also determined aircraft traffic both ground taxi-ing (also very similar to road traffic) and in the air for departures, arrivals, and in route,” Payne said. Utilizing his training, Payne has developed his own proposals that he hopes will appeal to other residents, the township, and ultimately the state DOT.
“Both of my proposals would greatly improve traffic flow on Route 1 and also east-west traffic flow. The major difference between the two proposals is that one will eliminate lights on Route 1 completely, and the other keeps one or two lights until an overpass can be built. Both plans will eliminate lights and are environmentally friendly.
“My plans will also maintain an even distribution to and from Princeton, will have no negative impact on Princeton businesses, and will preserve the Canal and Elm Allee, and should make everyone happy. Plain and simple, we need a Washington Road bypass that will divert east-west traffic north of SRI to promote balanced east-west travel to and from Princeton and eliminate traffic lights on Route 1.”
Payne said that “the DOT ‘new plan’ is simply a modified version of the failed pilot program. The DOT plan adds another light and will further slow down traffic on Route 1, which already moves at a snail’s pace. A new jughandle will not prevent that from happening again, and Penn’s Neck will end up the U-turn of choice once again for lost or angry travelers. The ‘new approach’ DOT came up with severely limits access to Princeton via Harrison Street and Washington Road for northbound travelers. It also forces people onto an already congested Alexander Road. They removed the left on Harrison again leaving only one viable option into Princeton (Alexander) without circumnavigating the maze of jughandles and U-turns to access Washington or Harrison. Remember the negative impact the pilot program had on Princeton businesses? It will happen again if the DOT plan is not modified.”
Added Payne: “A DOT representative told me that they expect this ‘temporary’ solution to be viable until 2035. That means we won’t see any more changes until then. We don’t need a temporary solution that will ‘pass’ for the next few years and end up costing us more in the future, we need a permanent solution. We need to fix it right the first time!”
At the meeting, Mayor Hsueh asked everyone to write their comments on forms that would be forwarded to the DOT. After listening to residents’ concerns, he said, “I agree with many of your recommendations. I agree that we need an overpass, but we are not going to get one. I want to make positive recommendations to DOT, so that at least some of our needs will be met. They are willing to listen to us, and they don’t have to. So I think it is important to work with them, and to work together with each other, just as we worked together to stop the pilot program.”
