Proper planning approach has been Mayor Cantu’s mantra

Mayor Cantu said his three-decade drive to be involved in Plainsboro’s government came from a concern for the township’s future

By: Greg Forester

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Staff photo by Frank Wojciechowski
Plainsboro Mayor Peter Cantu points to the Plainsboro Village Center as an achievement of a thorough planning process.


   PLAINSBORO — Since his ascent onto the Township Committee in 1975 and the mayor’s office in 1977, Mayor Peter Cantu has guided Plainsboro through massive development that has changed the face of the municipality.
   He has seen Plainsboro go from a municipality of 1,000 people and 2,000 cows to one boasting 21,000 people, few cows, and a variety of high-tech businesses.
   Through it all, one of his most important focuses has been on long-term planning, with responsible economic development coupled with careful preservation of the township, Mayor Cantu said.
   Nowadays Plainsboro boasts high-tech business, offices and a diversity of housing options that attract many different people looking to live in a suburban New Jersey town close to rail links and the Route 1 corridor, he said.
   Mayor Cantu said his three-decade drive to be involved in Plainsboro’s government came from a concern for the township’s future, spurred by township decisions made in the 1970s that created the thousands of apartments that presently straddle Plainsboro and Dey roads.
   "There is nothing wrong with building apartments, but the leadership of Plainsboro was making serious mistakes with long-term planning in the 1970s," said Mayor Cantu. "I was concerned that without proper planning, Plainsboro would never reach its potential."
   With those sentiments, Mayor Cantu said his focus became the development of long-range planning for the township that would balance the needs for development with preservation, that would allow his town to reach its full potential.
   "What we have looked to do is preserve a comprehensive and balanced plan of preservation, economic development, and the creation of a variety of housing types," Mayor Cantu said.
   One of the recent results of this balanced attack on township planning is the Plainsboro Village Center.
   The mixed-use development — one of the newest features of the Cantu-era Plainsboro — is adjacent to the village area that made up old farming-oriented Plainsboro, and features homes, businesses, and apartments configured in a way the designers envisioned as a departure from the kind of suburban sprawl typical of much of New Jersey.
   It came about after of much planning by the Plainsboro municipal government, along with input from the community during a series of public meeting.
   Mayor Cantu said he is extremely proud of the result.
   "I think we have been able to achieve a focal point for the community, that many towns don’t have," Mayor Cantu said.
   There are also Plainsboro’s pharmaceutical businesses, and the Princeton Forrestal Center, which Mayor Cantu called one of today’s premier corporate centers.
   Future projects include the move of the University Medical Center at Princeton to the Plainsboro FMC site off of Route 1.
   That project will be receiving the same careful planning and community input that has guided past projects in Plainsboro, Mayor Cantu said.
   Mayor Cantu’s path in life was guided by his father’s decision to become a commuter using the Princeton Junction train station to go to work in New York, a decision that foreshadowed the growth of the Route 1 corridor and the townships with nearby railway access, like Plainsboro and West Windsor.
   "My father found out that he could get to New York in under an hour," said Mayor Cantu. "And it was a better commute than taking the blue bus in Bergen County."
   Following a move from Bergen County to Plainsboro in 1955, Mayor Cantu spent the later part of his childhood living in the farming town that Plainsboro was in the 1950s, and then made the move to Princeton in 1961.
   Prior to the Princeton move, Mayor Cantu made another move that helped him fit into the close-knit community that was Plainsboro back then: marrying a Plainsboro girl, Gale Thompson, who had been born in a township farmhouse.
   Following their marriage, the couple ended up renting in Princeton, while Mayor Cantu worked at IBM and attended Rider University night school.
   One child, and then another became part of the family, Mayor Cantu said.
   After his father passed away, an offer came from his stepmother to take over the old house, and move back into the Plainsboro home where he had lived.
   "She didn’t want to mow the lawn anymore," said Mayor Cantu, who moved back in 1967. "We liked the community and had friends in Plainsboro, and we have been here ever since."
   He has maintained the office of mayor and a seat on the Township Committee for more than three decades?
   "The secret to this does not lie in any individual, but in a team of both elected and appointed officials and the community," said Mayor Cantu. "We look for people who can work together as a team, because when people get along, we arrive at good decisions as a community."
   He is pretty much a full-time mayor these days, having retired from both IBM in 1989 and a position with a Middlesex County transportation body two years ago, and will make a decision in the future about continuing to be one of Plainsboro’s guiding hands.
   "I enjoy what I do, and have been able to devote extra time to the job since I retired," said Mayor Cantu. "It really depends on my wife."