Hold on before you start parking at the Monmouth Heights Swim Club in Manalapan and jumping onto a bus bound for New York City.
Although the Manalapan Township Committee recently adopted an ordinance that provides for 150 parking spaces at the Monmouth Heights Swim Club, Ryan Road, to be set aside for municipal use, it appears that it may not be a done deal.
The swim club, which is just off Route 9 and behind the Manalapan Diner, serves residents of the Monmouth Heights development.
Lenny Gingold, president of the Monmouth Heights Swim Club, told the News Transcript the deal with Manalapan is not definite. He said he believes it was prematurely announced and acted upon by the Township Committee.
According to Gingold, the members of the swim club board met in October to discuss the township’s proposal and drafted “a list of things we would like if we even go forward.” He declined to say what was on the list, pending a response from municipal officials.
“Nothing may happen, but we’ll wait and see,” he said.
Gingold said he thought the members of the governing body acted prematurely and arbitrarily in announcing that a deal had been reached with the swim club for parking accommodations and then adopting an ordinance to support that decision.
When apprised of Gingold’s take on the matter, Mayor Michelle Roth said, “During initial conversations with the representatives from the Monmouth Heights Swim Club, we explained that in order for the township to be able to move forward on an agreement, we would first need to put funding into place to pay for any expenses the township would incur.
“We did this by ordinance, which requires a public hearing. It is our hope that the (swim club) board and the township can reach a mutually beneficial agreement. We will be discussing the Monmouth Heights Swim Club’s response to our proposal at the next Township Committee meeting (Nov. 12),” the mayor said.
Roth said if the deal is mutually acceptable and moves ahead, the commuter parking spaces at the swim club will be allocated according to an existing waiting list of Manalapan residents, with no preference given to Monmouth Heights residents. She estimated there are about 900 residents on the waiting list for a commuter parking permit.
According to Roth, at the time of the ordinance’s adoption, if the deal were to be consummated, most of the parking spaces at the swim club would have been reserved for Manalapan residents who commute to work via buses on Route 9 every day.
According to the ordinance that was adopted Sept. 13, the operators of the Monmouth Heights Swim Club will lease the swim club’s parking lot to Manalapan to be used for commuter parking from the day after Labor Day until the third week in June of each year, starting in 2009.
Roth also announced that the parking lot would be used to provide commuter parking at a fee of $2 per day for commuters. Part of the proposal includes the provision that a handful of the 150 parking spaces at the swim club be set aside for people who take an occasional bus trip into New York City. That daily fee would be $2.
Residents would be required to obtain a permit and to place it on their car so police officers who patrol the swim club lot could be certain that only Manalapan residents were parking there.
Under the terms of the ordinance, Manalapan would receive a 10-year lease from the swim club and in return the township would pave the swim club parking lot and provide ongoing maintenance of the lot. The services would also include plowing the parking lot following a snowstorm. The ordinance provides for $90,000 to be expended for needed work on the swim club parking lot.
Roth has also said that officials are working on an agreement to open up 100 commuter parking spaces behind Bed, Bath and Beyond at Route 9 and Craig Road, as well as at other areas in town that she declined to identify because those deals are being negotiated. The Franklin Lane, Symmes Drive and Towne Pointe commuter parking lots will remain on an annual fee basis.
At the present time there are 1,100 commuter parking spaces in Manalapan:
• There are 516 parking spaces at the Franklin Lane commuter lot.
• There are 100 parking spaces at a daily parking lot on Franklin Lane (current daily fee of $1; expected to be raised to $2).
• There are 200 commuter parking spaces at the Symmes Drive and Route 9 parking lot across from Value City.
• There are 200 commuter parking spaces at the Towne Pointe shopping center, Route 9.
• There are 100 commuter parking spaces behind the Bed, Beth and Beyond store at Route 9 and Craig Road.