Objectives are to protect the rural, historic character of the area
By John Tredrea, Staff Writer
A petition requesting that through traffic be banned from Aunt Molly Road has been signed by 461 residents and was presented to the Hopewell Township Committee Monday night.
Joanne Lockwood, who lives on Aunt Molly Road and gave the committee the petition, said its signers’ objectives are “to keep Aunt Molly Road as it is, so as to protect the rural, historic character of the area.”
She said, “Aunt Molly Road lies in the center of the St. Michael’s tract” that is in the process of being preserved for passive recreation. “There will be a trail for jogging, hiking and horseback riding that crosses the Aunt Molly Road.”
On Wednesday, Ms. Lockwood said that those who signed the petition support closing Aunt Molly Road to through traffic by putting up a single gate on the portion of the road crossed by the St. Michael’s tract. The gate could be opened by operators of emergency service vehicles.
”Residents of Aunt Molly Road and school buses would still be able to get where they need to go,” she said. “The gate would just be there to close the road to through traffic.”
Traffic and speeding would increase dramatically if the road is paved, Ms. Lockwood and many other opponents of paving the central one-third of Aunt Molly Road are predicting.
The petition to close the road to through traffic is the latest development in the years-long debate on whether to pave the central one-third of the road. That debate has heated up markedly in recent months.
About 1.6 miles long, Aunt Molly runs north from Cherry Valley Road to Route 518. In recent months, dozens of people have addressed the Township Committee about whether to pave the central portion of the road. Most of those who have spoken have opposed paving. Nearly 10 residents spoke on the matter Monday night. All opposed paving.
The township’s Historic Preservation, Environmental, Agricultural and Open Space groups have voted unanimously to recommend to the Hopewell Township Committee that Aunt Molly Road not be paved.
The Township Committee took no action on the paving issue Monday night, but the matter will be addressed by the committee again soon, Mayor Vanessa Sandom said, perhaps at the committee’s next meeting, on Sept. 22.
Expected to be discussed as part of the Aunt Molly Road issue is the future of the oddly configured, heavily traveled Mount Rose intersection. That intersection is a short distance west of Aunt Molly Road’s southern end. Carter Road, which intersects Cherry Valley Road to form the Mount Rose intersection, runs parallel to Aunt Molly Road.
The petition got a mixed reaction.
Longtime township resident Sophie Pedersen, who lives on Pennington-Rocky Hill Road at a point not close to Aunt Molly said, “We all own Aunt Molly Road, not just the people who live on it. I’d love to close Pennington-Rocky Hill Road to through traffic — I feel like I take my life in my hand every time I go to my mailbox — but I don’t own it. I guess the bottom line is that I’ve had a problem listening to people say they want to close something they don’t own.”

