By Philip Sean Curran, Staff Writer
New Jersey’s latest proposal to lessen congestion on Route 1 in the Princeton region has area mayors thinking hard about what’s the best solution for a problem that is not getting better.
Route 1 was one of the topics the mayors of Plainsboro, Princeton, South Brunswick and West Windsor addressed Saturday morning during a seminar focusing on regional planning.
The event, run by local think tank Princeton Future at the former Borough Hall, did not focus entirely on Route 1 or the latest “concept” by the state Department of Transportation to widen the highway, add three jug handles and change the road in other ways. The state has floated that concept, one that DOT Commissioner James S. Simpson advocated for during a speech to local businessmen and women in Princeton last week.
At Saturday’s event, the four mayors sat down for a panel discussion. At one point, moderator Katherine Kish of Princeton Future asked them if they thought the money it would take for the Route 1 project, put at around $40 million, would be better spent on mass transit.
”You have a problem on Route 1,” said Plainsboro Mayor Peter Cantu, who credited Mr. Simpson for trying to do things to improve traffic flow. He said the DOT proposal “seems to make sense” but offered that it needs “careful study.”
”You’re not going to be able to keep expanding Route 1,” said West Windsor Mayor Shing-Fu Hsueh, “but at some point you’ve got to be able to at least to try to minimize the impact, particularly in the neighborhoods.”
Princeton Mayor Liz Lempert said Mr. Simpson is interested in putting effort and money into helping with the problem.
”And I think we need to take advantage of it, not to the exclusion of transit improvements,” she said. “But you have somebody who’s willing to work on that problem and I think we need to seize the opportunity.”
Route 1 does not go directly through Princeton the way it does in the other three communities represented Saturday.
”We should get together and make the state widen Route 1,” said South Brunswick Mayor Frank Gambatese. A few weeks ago, he formed a master plan committee to change the zoning of the nearly seven miles of highway that runs in his town.
Mayor Cantu said he thinks it’s important to have mass transit improvements.
In their remarks, the mayors also weighed in on proposed legislation that would allow private colleges to bypass local planning and zoning boards. In all four towns, Princeton University is a landholder.
”If they decided to do something without coming though the township, that would be horrible,” said Mayor Hsueh of the school.

