Members of Lawrence’s Growth and Redevelopment Committee tour township
By: T.J. Furman
Finding a way to create a “main street” atmosphere in the area around Brunswick Pike was the focus of a tour of Lawrence Township taken by members of the Growth and Redevelopment Committee Saturday morning.
The tour was organized by growth and redevelopment chairman Michael Powers to show the committee’s two newest members the areas the committee is focusing its efforts on and the ideas it has for the future.
Much of the focus of the tour was on finding ways to slow the traffic in the Brunswick Pike South Redevelopment Area in order to make it more attractive to pedestrians. Among the ideas discussed was removing the concrete median and replacing it with a grass one, lining Brunswick Pike (Route 1 Alternate) with trees on either side and providing for on-street parking.
Township Council in November designated the Brunswick Pike South Redevelopment Area. Properties in the redevelopment area may qualify for long-term or short-term property tax incentives for making major improvements — either new construction or rehabilitation of older buildings.
“We’ve asked the (state Department of Transportation) to slow down Brunswick Pike,” Mr. Powers said while traveling south on the road on the way to the intersection with Whitehead Road. “Right now it’s like a game of ‘Frogger’ trying to cross the highway.”
Mr. Powers and growth and redevelopment member John Conroy pointed out that Brunswick Pike’s speed limit (between 45 and 55 mph) is too high given its current use.
The road used to be the only stretch of Route 1 between Lawrence and Trenton and was thus a major throughway for commuter traffic in the state. Since the construction of the Route 1 thoroughfare in the 1970s — and the conversion of Brunswick Pike from Route 1 to Route 1 Alternate — Brunswick Pike has been less traveled and thus no longer needs such a high speed limit, Mr. Powers and Mr. Conroy explained.
The stretch of road from where the thoroughfare breaks off in Lawrence south to the Lawrence Shopping Center (about three-quarters of a mile) is 55 mph. From there south to the Brunswick Circle, the speed limit is 45 mph.
“Forty-five means you can go 50,” Mr. Conroy said.
James Cordingley, a member of growth and redevelopment, pointed out Brunswick Pike’s unfriendliness to walkers by remarking, “Do you see a crosswalk anywhere?”
A pedestrian-friendly road also would take advantage of the many neighborhoods that are located just behind businesses along the road, committee members said.
When the group filed out of the van and into the parking lot of what was an Eckerd pharmacy until earlier this year, Mr. Conroy, an architect with The Hillier Group in Princeton, made some conceptual sketches to show the group how trees, medians and parking can make the street safer for pedestrians.
“I think what our goal is, is to take this wide road and to maybe start to narrow it a little bit,” Mr. Conroy said. Gathered around him were Mr. Powers, Mr. Cordingley, Andrew Link, township planner, Township Councilwoman Pam Mount, council’s liaison to growth and redevelopment; and new growth and redevelopment members Richard Gramlich and Tushar Patel.
“By taking down a 45 mph speed limit sign and putting up a 25 one won’t do it,” Mr. Conroy continued. “You have to tighten up the traffic, you have to insert pedestrian walkways. When you start to heavily line this thing with trees, it makes the whole thing feel tighter, so it makes you feel like you have to slow down.”
Providing on-street parking also will help calm traffic, he said, and allow for more sidewalks.
“Also, now businesses won’t have to surround themselves with a sea of parking which ruins any opportunity for anything visual to happen,” Ms. Mount explained.
Ms. Mount also mentioned the possibility of cooperative parking lots for businesses similar to those used on Main Street in the village of Lawrenceville.
Because of the nature of the road, jughandles are necessary for making left-hand turns off Brunswick Pike. By slowing the traffic, the need for the jughandles would no longer exist, freeing up more space for possible commercial development or preservation.
Such a jughandle exists at the end of Whitehead Road. Mr. Conroy made a quick sketch of a possible “gateway” tower and courtyard for the land where the jughandle now sits. The intersection is important as a welcoming area to Lawrence and the redevelopment area, Mr. Conroy said, because of commuters going to and from the N.J. Transit rail station on Sloan Avenue in Hamilton Township.
Mr. Conroy has been in touch with architecture schools at Syracuse University, the New Jersey Institute of Technology and Cornell University to develop a contest among architecture students to create a “look” for a downtown main street the committee would use as a guide for the redevelopment zone.
All of these ideas will hinge upon the state Department of Transportation, however, because it has jurisdiction over Brunswick Pike as a state road. The committee members hope to get the state to make the improvements they would like to see on the road and then turn all responsibility for maintenance and repairs to the township. Mr. Gromlich, who works for the DOT, said that scenario is similar to an agreement between the state and Hamilton concerning a stretch of Route 206 in southern Mercer County.
The group also visited the site where an 80,000-square-foot ShopRite has received preliminary approval from the Planning Board. Growth and Redevelopment Committee members expressed an interest in seeing the Planning Board require the project’s developer to plant trees along its Brunswick Circle Extension footage to mirror those already planted across the street from the site, creating a more pedestrian-friendly area.
The tour also made stops at the Lawrence Shopping Center to look at recent improvements and at the future site of RCN’s corporate headquarters on Princeton Pike.
Mr. Conroy praised the RCN application and said it was able to make its way through the approval process quickly because the developer, Matrix Development Group, had worked closely with township officials on a daily basis leading up to the hearings and often made requested changes overnight.
Growth and redevelopment members said the relocation of a telecommunications company like RCN to the township could make the township attractive to similar, smaller businesses that are in the “new wave” of commerce.
“We want people to realize that Lawrence is a place that is progressive,” Ms. Mount said. “We’ll work with people and we’re not just going to beat up on people coming in with, perhaps, a new idea. We’re going to make something positive for the community.”