It is a beautiful day. The sun is just starting to peak over the trees. The sky is blue. I hear a mourning dove’s call.
Then the diesel engines start.
Petty Road marks the boundary between Cranbury and Plainsboro townships. One side of the road has homes of Plainsboro citizens. The other side of the road is in Cranbury Township. It was a farm but is now being developed by Toll Brothers into a residential subdivision.
To manage noise levels, Cranbury Township informed Plainsboro residents that work would start at 7 a.m. While main construction activity starts at 7 a.m. Toll Brothers often leaves diesel generators and pumps running over night. There also is prep activity that starts before 6 a.m. as they prepare the equipment for the day.
Complaints to Cranbury Township, via email and in-person at township meetings, have not yielded results with Plainsboro residents being told to take their complaints to other agencies. In frustration, residents have put up a banner asking Toll Brothers and Cranbury Township for consideration with regards to the noise.
Is it too much to expect the township to enforce noise regulations? Without enforcement Toll Brothers doesn’t need to think about the neighbors and can choose to run their equipment directly in front of people’s houses at dawn.
Victor Abiad
Cranbury