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MANVILLE: Bowling alley demolition will limit access to stores

Businesses advised to think about deliveries

By Gene Robbins, Managing Editor
   When Manville Lanes is demolished in the next few weeks, some South Main Street businesses will lose some parking at the rear of their stores and will face a more difficult time with deliveries.
   An access road across the bowling alley to Valerie Drive will also be cut off to drivers, walkers and bicyclists.
   Meeting with about 15 people Monday afternoon in the borough courtroom, Mayor Angelo Corradino and Borough Administrator Gary Garwacke described the effect of fencing that would be erected while the demolition takes place.
   The businesses were advised that delivery vehicles will have to reach the back of properties from a road off Main Street at the Subway/Dunkin Donuts. Tractor-trailers may have a hard time making a U-turn and may have to back out, proprietors were told.
   Once the demolition is completed, the borough hopes the property owners move the fence to allow the restoration of some parking. If the fence remains, slotted angle parking may be replaced with parallel parking. Some spaces will be lost, if that happens.
   The borough doesn’t have control over the fencing or access on the private land, the mayor repeated many times Monday.
   The razing of the Ten Pin Lanes will completely clear about 50 acres, some of which was once contaminated, lying between the railroad tracks and East Camplain Road. Now that the federal environmental agencies have certified the land as clean, the borough wants to see the entire 50-acre property redeveloped with a mix of retail and residential uses.
   The borough owns a right-of-way off East Camplain Road toward the back of the businesses that front on Main Street. Part of the right-of-way creates a parking area reachable from South Main, but access to East Camplain is blocked off because broken pavement and sidewalks from the cleanup period have made it dangerous, said Mr. Garwacke.
   Mayor Corradino said the borough would inform owners and proprietors a few days in advance of the start of demolition work at the alley.
   Mayor Corradino said the borough attorney has told the property owner’s attorneys that the borough expects some general redevelopment plan and a timeline by Oct. 31. If not, the borough will move to condemn the site and act to develop it on its own.
   ”My goal is to have a shovel in the ground by the end of next year,” said the mayor.
   The site’s owner, Garden Homes/Garden Commercial and its principal owner, “Ziggy” Wilf, have an agreement for a mixed-use development of residences, businesses, offices and senior citizen housing to go on the site. No specifics have been presented.
   The land was where the Federal Creosote Co. manufactured the wood preservative from about 1911 to 1956. Evidence of toxic chemicals was found in 1998, and the federal Environmental Protection Agency worked from the late 1990s through about 2007 to remove potentially harmful soil. In the process, about 18 homes and other businesses, streets and infrastructure were removed. Mr. Garwacke said. The EPA left the site in late 2007, he said, and the flat lot sits fenced and vacant.