WW planners want proof of DOT intentions at Nassau Park

As part of expansion, major changes at access points planned.

By: Gwen Runkle
   WEST WINDSOR — Plans to expand the Nassau Park shopping center, bordered by Route 1 and Quakerbridge Road, by nearly 80,000 square feet have not been approved just yet.
   On Wednesday, the township Planning Board decided to continue its review of the third and final phase of the shopping center until Feb. 26.
   The board decided on the continuation so the applicant, DDR Nassau Pavilion Associates, could get written proof from the state Department of Transportation showing it agrees to carry out a long list of traffic improvements for the center — including the removal of the signal and jughandle at the intersection of Route 1 and Nassau Park Boulevard.
   "The applicant says the state has agreed verbally," said Marvin Gardner, Planning Board chairman. "But we want to be absolutely certain that the state has made a commitment to do the improvements."
   According to representatives of DDR Nassau Pavilion Associates, the DOT is expected to have a design for removing the traffic signal and jughandle at Route 1 and Nassau Park Boulevard by the end of 2003 and construction could begin in the winter of 2004 or 2005.
   Other improvements, such as removing the southbound Route 1 U-turn at Nassau Park Boulevard, creating a northbound distribution-collector road on Route 1 at Quakerbridge Road and improving the Quakerbridge Road and Nassau Park Boulevard intersection, also would be completed by the DOT, representatives of the applicant said.
   John Dourgarian, spokesman for the DOT, did not return calls for comment by press time.
   Concerns about lighting and crime from neighboring residents also were addressed at Wednesday’s meeting.
   The third phase of the center includes two separate buildings — a 37,200- square-foot Babies R Us and a 40,000-square-foot miscellaneous retail store — with more than 400 parking spaces on a 20-acre site located in the area where the Richard’s Farm Market is today, west of the Blue Tulip, Hollywood Tans and Famous Footwear stores.