Patients, visitors and employees can use Scudders Mill Road leading to the hospital entrance on Campus Road or use Plainsboro Road, which has its own entrance.
By Pam Hersh
Seven years ago, the Princeton HealthCare System Board members, administrators, physicians, staff, and community representatives from throughout the region came to the conclusion that the healthcare needs of the residents in the region would be best served if the System’s acute care hospital expanded its physical space at a location other than the current Witherspoon Street site in Princeton.
The consensus was that the Witherspoon location in the middle of an older residential neighborhood never would be able to accommodate the expansion needed to deliver the highest level of excellence in 21st century health care to hundreds of thousands of Central Jersey residents.
The decision-makers knew the following: the who (the patients and employees); the what (University Medical Center at Princeton – UMCP); and the when (end of 2011/first half of 2012). The where was a more complex decision. And once the location was determined, the question became how – how to get there.
The crucial question then became where the replacement hospital should be located to best serve its patients, physicians, and staff. Consideration of 16 tracts of land in Central Jersey produced one clear winner: the tract of land bounded by Route 1, Scudders Mill Road, Campus Road, and Plainsboro Road/the Millstone River in Plainsboro. In addition to being a physically beautiful site that overlooks the banks of the Millstone River, the site also has logistical beauty. Only 2.5 miles from Palmer Square, the new hospital to be known as University Medical Center of Princeton at Plainsboro (UMCPP) is closer to 70 percent of PHCS’ patients and employees.
The site at One Plainsboro Road has excellent accessibility for those who drive their own vehicles and for those who avail themselves of mass transit or private shuttle services.
Patients, visitors and employees can use Scudders Mill Road leading to the hospital entrance on Campus Road or use Plainsboro Road, which has its own entrance. It is possible to access Scudders Mill Road and Plainsboro Road from the north, south, east and west via Route 1. Or Route 1 can be avoided, if the driver approaches the hospital from the east; some drivers coming from the west prefer to cross Route 1 at such points as Ridge Road or the College Road East or Route 571 and then connect with Scudders Mill Road and Plainsboro Road on the east.
In addition to all of the routes that self-drive patients and visitors can take to the hospital, rescue vehicles have a special access driveway on Route 1 leading directly to the Emergency Department.
Recent road improvements that facilitate the drive include:
Route 1 and Harrison Street. The Harrison Street improvement, which was completed in December 2011, involves the addition of a lane on Harrison Street between Route 1 and Eden Way. There is one lane exclusively for left turns and the second lane allows right and left turns. Thus it is possible now to turn left onto Route 1 to the hospital from two lanes. This improvement has reduced rush-hour vehicular wait time at the light dramatically; a particularly long wait-time at rush hour of nine light-changing cycles has been reduced to 1.5 light changing cycles. The improvement also includes new signaling at Harrison Street and Route 1 that will allow rescue vehicles – and Princeton University Public Safety vehicles equipped with special remote-control technology to change the traffic light. PHCS purchased the remote-control technology in the signal and the light-changing remote-control units for the rescue squad vehicles. In addition, drainage on Harrison Street has been improved.
Route 1 between Harrison Street and Plainsboro Road. This segment of Route One has been upgraded with a new bridge under the roadway and over the Millstone River – an improvement that should reduce flooding on Route 1. Coming from Princeton to the new hospital, the emergency vehicles will be able to use the new shoulder (Route 1 Northbound) to access the Route 1 Emergency Vehicle Only Access Driveway that leads directly to the Emergency Department.
Three million dollars of other local road improvements at various intersections in the vicinity of the hospital on Scudders Mill Road, Plainsboro Road, and Campus Road. The most extensive of these road improvements is the construction of a culvert on Plainsboro Road and the reconstruction of Plainsboro road between Route 1 and Campus Road. This work has eliminated the flooding on Plainsboro Road, a major access road to the hospital.
Also, the site is one of the most transit friendly suburban locations in Central Jersey, served by multiple bus routes, including a new Princeton to Plainsboro bus route. Seniors citizens living in Mercer County and parts of Middlesex County and Somerset County can get to the hospital at no cost, thanks to special cooperative agreements between the hospital and senior transportation services. All seniors who come to the hospital via a shuttle or transit services are guaranteed a ride home if their transit service has stopped running before the conclusion of their hospital business. All Princeton residents who are clinic patients and who have gotten to the clinic by walking now will get free bus transportation to the new hospital in Plainsboro.
The transit services listed below will stop at UMCPP
NJ Transit service from Princeton Junction train station (600 bus).
NJ Transit service from Trenton (600 bus).
NJ Transit service from Princeton (655 bus).
Middlesex County Transportation shuttle service from Monroe/Jamesburg/Cranbury/Princeton Junction (M6).
NJ Transit Northeast Corridor trains from Princeton Junction – then connect with 600 bus or M6 shuttle.
Many other bus lines connect with the 600 and 655 buses for easy transfer.
Princeton University’s Tiger Transit Shuttle from Princeton University campus/Dinky Station.
Senior citizens living in Mercer County, south Somerset County and south Middlesex County can get to the current hospital site and the new hospital site at no cost, thanks to the hospital collaborating with municipal senior transport services, as well as with one non-profit private senior transport service called Ride Provide. Seniors living in Monroe have access to the on-demand transportation provided by UMCPP, as well as municipal sponsored shuttles. Also, the hospital guarantees rides home for any senior citizen who gets to the hospital via some sort of shuttle system and misses the last shuttle home.
Users of the clinic now known as Bristol-Myers Squibb Community Health Center at University Medical Center of Princeton at Plainsboro (UMCPP) – who in the past have gotten to the clinic on Witherspoon Street by walking – will be entitled to free bus tickets on the 655 Bus, which will stop next to the former hospital site – 281 Witherspoon Street, Princeton. Bus tickets will be available at the Princeton HealthCare Community Information Center in the lower level of 281 Witherspoon Office Building or at First Baptist Church on Paul Robeson Place, Princeton.

