Fields application on ARC’s agenda Monday
By:Ruth Luse
The Recreation Foundation of Hopewell Valley and the Recreation Roundtable will host an open house tonight between 7 and 9 p.m. in the Activity Room of the Hopewell Township Branch, Mercer Library.
The library is located on Pennington-Titusville Road (West Delaware Avenue), just east of Hopewell Valley Central High School.
The purpose of this special event is to give all interested Hopewell Valley residents an opportunity to view the revised plans for athletic fields on the 48 acres at Back Timberlane.
Members of the Roundtable and professionals working on the project will be available to address individual questions and concerns.
Revisions to the plan have been filed with and will be reviewed by the Hopewell Township Application Review Committee (ARC) in preparation for presentation to the full Hopewell Township Planning Board at a future date.
Recreation Foundation of Hopewell Valley Inc. will be going before the ARC on at 9 a.m. Monday.
The ARC’s job is to rule on the completeness of the application, which in this case is for site plan, preliminary/final for athletic fields at Timberlane (Block 63, Lot 4 Scotch Road).
When the review is complete, the ARC will send the application on to the full Hopewell Township Planning Board for final action.
The updated plans include: modifications based on concerns about irrigation, drainage, buffers for neighboring properties, and lighting; a full traffic study; an assessment of need based on reports from the school district, recreational leagues and organizations such as the YMCA and American Legion baseball; and an analysis of maintenance costs.
More specifically, changes include:
Irrigation and field lighting have been removed. A conduit for irrigation and field lighting has been eliminated.
The large parking lot along Scotch Road has been removed. In conjunction, the landscape buffer in this area has been increased from a 40-foot-wide, newly-planted buffer to a buffer averaging 70 feet of existing woodland and 30 feet of newly-planted meadow on the interior side of the buffer.
The smaller parking lot on Pennington-Titusville Road has been adjusted so that no entrance is opposite existing homes. Additionally a 4-foot-high berm has been added to the buffer along with a densely planted screen of red cedars, native shrubs, and native shade trees. A drive-through drop-off point also has been added to this lot.
The parking lot on Pennington-Titusville Road includes handicapped and bus parking and has been expanded to include islands for shade trees.
Landscape planting Plants native to Central New Jersey will be used and 35 trees existing on the site will be transplanted as part of the plan.
A storm water detention basin is proposed to be constructed near the corner of Scotch and Pennington-Harbourton roads. The basin is designed to address existing flooding problems along Pennington-Harbourton Road.
Questions about the open house should be directed to the Hopewell Valley Municipal Alliance at 737-0605, ext. 642.