Two Democratic candidates for Hillsborough Township Committee say the “town center” zoning in place for the concentrated core of the township is flawed and they have offered ideas to improve it.
In a written statement, Jason Storipan and Art Skaar, say it’s “wrong to blame the slow economy for the lack of development activity.”
They say the town center plan is “badly flawed.”
”To date, the only application filed was done so with the Board of Adjustment,” the statement said. “The developer looked at the law and asked for relief in order to build anything marketable. Oops. That is a bad sign.”
Mr. Skaar and Mr. Storipan said “the plan is workable” with “vision and leadership.”
To encourage buildings to be built closer to Route 206 and to Amwell Road, the town center plan requires developers to build a portion of a road at the rear of their property for access, they said.
”This ‘reverse frontage’ would be attractive when completed, but it is causing landowners to wait for others to build their portion of the road before it can function as a road. Unless the property is located at a side street, the road a developer builds behind the property is a road to nowhere,” they said.
The plan also requires a mix of residential and business use, “but putting apartments above businesses will not bring us the high-end residential development we need,” they said. “We need to ensure that any new development meets the needs of potential residents based on location, convenience and availability of amenities.”
The plan lacks the infrastructure improvements that will promote a pedestrian friendly downtown, and there is no plan to enable people to bicycle safely to the downtown area, they wrote.
Architectural design options of the business owners are limited in the zone, they said. “While there is something to be said about consistent and appealing design requirements, the plan needs to be amended to promote architecture that is also sympathetic to the needs of the business owners,” they said.
Ideally, the central business district will generate the money to pay the taxes to educate our kids and run our town. Effective partnership with the business owners to build and promote an effective town center is essential.
The town center plan “needs to address the fact that we have a school at the main intersection in town. That location is one of the biggest potential tax ratables in town but instead it is contributing to traffic congestion while generating no income,” they said.
