#b#Disappointment on Canal Pointe Blvd#/b#
Dear Mayor Hsueh,
When we started our new term on January 1, both the Council members and you agreed to put politics aside and work together. For the most part, all Council members to date have kept their part of the bargain. However, I am very disappointed with your handling of the Canal Pointe Boulevard improvement project.
You knew full well that the council had scheduled a work session to discuss the project on March 21. And you are aware that there are two opposite points of view, with people from the affected area on either side of the issue. But rather than listen to public comment and Council’s discussion, you left after the business meeting before the work session even began.
It appears that you have made up your mind and are not interested in offering the courtesy of hearing from residents who waited patiently for more than an hour to make their comments.
What triggers this letter is what I found out after the meeting. You have shown complete disregard for how township policy should be decided on any issue, especially one as significant as this.
Several times during the last three months the Council has asked questions about the administration’s decision-making process for this project. Until the March 21 work session meeting, Council members were not aware that a Request For Proposals (RFP) for engineering design services for the repaving and restriping of Canal Pointe Boulevard had been issued. We were only told that the writing of the RFP was near completion.
So the Council went through the entire work session without knowing the contents of the RFP or the fact that an RFP had been issued. During the meeting, the business administrator was forced to make an assertion (which turns out to be incorrect) that the RFP is neutral regarding options for the road.
When the Council president requested a copy of the RFP for Council’s review the next morning, we discovered that not only had the RFP been released as of March 7, but that the deadline for submissions was Friday, March 18, at 11 a.m. That’s three days prior to the work session meeting on March 21.
Moreover, the RFP is not neutral on the options but emphasizes the “Road Diet” as the only option. Please tell the residents of Canal Pointe why this information was not important enough to be shared with either the Council or the residents who came to voice their opinion at the meeting.
In a subsequent e-mail you insist that the contents of the RFP are confidential. I don’t understand how a document that has been issued in the public domain for vendors to respond can be deemed confidential and council members told not to share it with anyone.
While under our form of government, you have the authority to make recommendations to the Council, your lack of seeking out a collaborative approach to decision-making is very disappointing. A true leader would have been present at the work session meeting and would have made sure that Council was fully informed as the process evolved.
This unfortunately puts Council in a very difficult situation of making policy decisions through the funding process since that is the only option available to them. In my opinion, that is the worst way of making policy decisions.
The timing of this project is of critical importance as the Council clearly indicated that it wants the job completed this year, and not in 2017 as you proposed in the capital budget. Delaying the repair of this decaying road is not fair to residents.
Fortunately, the funds required to complete the project in 2016 are already identified in the existing budget. However, your lack of a collaborative approach on deciding how to restripe the road will only lead to unnecessary delay and potentially push the project to next year.
I urge you to attend Council meetings, listen to resident input, take an active part in the discussion, and to use a collaborative approach on all issues.
Hemant Marathe
Vice President,
West Windsor Council
#b#Canal Pointe: An Explanation for Residents#/b#
At the March 21 meeting the West Windsor council discussed the Canal Pointe Boulevard (CPB) improvement project for the first time. Through his actions Mayor Hsueh has indicated that he will proceed with the road diet (only one travel lane in each direction, a turning lane, and two bike lanes) irrespective of the consequences. After studying the report produced by the Burns group and talking to people on both sides of the issues, I am writing this letter to Mayor Hsueh and residents of that neighborhood to document why I am very uncomfortable with the choice the mayor is trying to impose.
First, CPB certainly has important traffic and safety issues that need immediate attention. However, when the mayor commissioned the study, rather than giving a broad mandate to study safety improvement for the road, the Burns group was given a predefined road diet plan and asked to justify that plan. The study document makes no mention of numerous safety measures that could be undertaken to make the road safe in its current configuration.
At the council meeting when the Burns group representative was asked, “Why does the study make no mention of emergency services vehicles response times?” his response was, “How many times are fire engines going to drive down that road?” I would hope that response time for ambulances and fire engines would be one of the most important safety measures for any road, especially one that is so busy.
At the council meeting chiefs of both the West Windsor and Princeton Junction volunteer fire companies told council during public comment that the road diet would make it very difficult for fire trucks and ambulances to maneuver. In private they are far more emphatic in stating that the road diet will slow down emergency response times and is not preferred by either of them.
Following the March 21 council meeting, I spoke with a former council member who ran on the mayor’s ticket and is a professional firefighter. His response was an equally emphatic “no” to the road diet plan, as it would make it very difficult for ambulances and fire trucks to operate. All of them admit that it would be a lot easier for police cars to manage the road diet since they are smaller and can drive over the curb.
Residents are being sold on the road diet with assurances that it will make the road safer. I encourage them to talk to volunteers who don’t owe their job to the administration and decide for yourself if this is in your best interest. After the project is completed you would have to live with it.
Second, the Burns report also clearly indicates that at full build-out with the road diet the traffic would be gridlocked along the road and it would take significant amounts of time to get out of developments along CPB. Some have suggested that if the road diet causes gridlock, we could redo the road. Given budget pressures on the township, that is unlikely to happen. For better or worse, we will have to live with the road configuration we choose for the foreseeable future.
Third, there is no dispute the road diet will cost more than regular four lanes with additional safety measures. The only question is whether it’s a high five-digit number or low six-digit number. I don’t see any payback in the hope that a few more bicyclists might use the road. There are many other projects around town that are waiting for lack of funding.
Fourth, the concept that any project that mentions “bike lanes” is environmentally friendly needs closer examination. To paraphrase a former prime minister of India, “The best environmental policy is the most efficient use of all resources.” The road diet is anything but an efficient use of resources. Roughly 27 percent of the road north of Meadow Road and 33 percent of the road south of Meadow Road would be used inefficiently in the hope that “if you build it they (bicyclist) will come.” The president of WWBPA was correct in identifying our town as a “recreational bike user town.” In other words, the proposed bike lanes would not significantly reduce the number of car trips. Thus the carbon footprint of that extra 12-foot bike lane would be much higher than any pollution you would save by a few extra people using the bike lanes.
Far more important would be the pollution caused by idling vehicles at stop signs and vehicles stuck in traffic. These would far outweigh the small amount of oil we might save from extra bicyclists, if any. I believe the total carbon footprint over the next 10 years of road diet far outweighs the carbon footprint of a regular four-lane road with significant safety improvements. Thus, I have a hard time accepting the road diet as the more environmentally friendly solution.
Finally, the extent to which the mayor has gone to avoid any discussion of the merits of the proposal should give residents of the area pause. It is unfortunate that the career employees of the township are being put in a difficult situation of withholding facts from the council or giving incomplete answers. Any policy decision for the township should be done independent of the funding mechanism. I can then live with the decision reached even if I don’t agree with it.
Unlike the mayor, I am open for discussion. If I have my facts incorrect, I am open to changing my mind. Otherwise I can’t morally and ethically support the road diet plan no matter how “politically popular” bike lanes may be.
Hemant Marathe
Vice President,
West Windsor Council
#b#Canal Pointe: Hsueh Explains#/b#
There has been a lot of conversation about Canal Pointe Boulevard and reducing the number of lanes from four to three. First, I’d like to go back to the history of this issue. In 1993, when I was running for Council, I met with numerous residents along Canal Pointe Boulevard. Many wanted traffic calming to reduce the speed of traffic and the danger it posed even to motorists pulling into and out of the residential neighborhoods.
In 2001, as mayor, I contacted the NJ Department of Transportation to request a study of bicycle and pedestrian-friendly roadways in West Windsor. This study was performed together with a bicycle and pedestrian task force that I established, and the resulting study in 2004 became an amendment to the township’s master plan in 2005. In that study Canal Pointe Boulevard was one of the areas analyzed, and that is where the idea for the lane reduction — also known as a “Road Diet” — originated.
In 2008 we contracted with the traffic engineering firm of Orth-Rodgers & Associates to look into the idea of the road diet applied to all of Canal Pointe Boulevard in greater detail. The preliminary report was completed in 2013, finalized in 2015, and an open public presentation was given in April, 2015. Recently, Council requested a work session to be held March 21, 2016, at which an updated presentation was provided.
Throughout this process the professionals and safety experts have continued to call for a reduction in the number of lanes along Canal Pointe Boulevard. Emergency Services has also approved the approach. The majority of those residents who commented on the original presentation in April, 2015, were for reducing the travel lanes from four to two and adding left turn and bicycle lanes. The majority of those who gave public comment at the work session in March, 2016, were also in favor of a safer Canal Pointe Boulevard with two travel lanes, left turn lanes, and bicycle lanes.
The most important effect this project will have is to increase safety for all users of Canal Pointe Boulevard, not just the drivers who will avoid being side-swiped and rear-ended, but also the residents who wish to walk and bicycle along the road and access retail services and office buildings across the street.
It should be noted that NRG Energy and Princeton University Information Technology Center with locations on Canal Pointe Boulevard are setting up bike share programs that their workers can use during the day. We know that bicycle traffic will increase. It has become clear that Canal Pointe Boulevard has become a cut through and bypass to Route 1 for people who have no consideration for local traffic; we must take local traffic into consideration in this road way improvement.
I have left the decision of a reduction in lanes for Canal Pointe Boulevard up to the professionals and have not involved myself in the dialogue. Unfortunately, it appears that some individuals have what I believe to be unfounded concerns about the road accommodating cars and traffic, and rather than trust the professionals, including traffic engineers and the police, to address those concerns, they prefer to keep the road as four lanes, ignoring the safety of pedestrians and cyclists.
However, the professionals will look into all concerns that have been voiced, including those of the volunteer firefighters, as the road design progresses. We are not contemplating building medians with trees in the center of the road. We should also remember that the width of the road is not changing at this time, and that if traffic does increase to an unacceptable level, further design changes can be made. But cars are like water and will seek the path of least resistance. If drivers do not like the delays encountered along a certain path, they will find an alternative.
I continue to view this project as a safety project. And we all know that the road must be repaved. At my direction, staff has worked to find funding to make this happen sooner as opposed to later.
But I request, and expect, Council to join me in supporting the professionals and this project of a reduction in travel lanes and the addition of turning lanes and bicycle lanes to ensure the safety of our residents and office workers who drive, bicycle, and walk along Canal Pointe Boulevard. We need to protect West Windsor Township from liability claims arising from accidents on the road.
We have seen terrible accidents between cars and cyclists and pedestrians too often in town. We must do what we can to prevent that from happening on Canal Pointe Boulevard. We must trust in the professionals and the experts.
Shing-Fu Hsueh
Mayor, West Windsor Township
