Politics & Government

Residents of Rosedale Acres Fear Trail Will Threaten Their Safety & Increase Crime in Their Neighborhood

The proposed section of the Lawrence Hopewell Trail through Rosedale Acres will follow public roads for three-tenths of a mile. Residents of the neighborhood oppose the trail, saying it will increase traffic, endanger their children, and promote crime.

A planned section of the Lawrence Hopewell Trail that would run about three-tenths of a mile along public streets was the subject of a lively debate that dominated the first hour of the (March 15).

A total of 13 people addressed council members during the public participation segment of the meeting, with seven of those being residents of the Rosedale Acres community voicing their opposition to the small part of the trail that would go through their neighborhood to link the section of the trail that currently runs through the Educational Testing Service campus with a yet-to-be-completed section of the trail that will pass through Carson Road Woods, a township park.

Residents of Rosedale Acres – which is located off Rosedale Road opposite ETS and includes Mya Drive, Benedek Road, Belleview Terrace and Vista Drive – said they are worried that extending the trail through their neighborhood would bring increased traffic and strangers that could pose a safety risk to their children. They said they are worried that crime will increase – causing their property values to suffer – and questioned from a public safety standpoint whether someone who becomes hurt on the trail going through Carson Road Woods would be able to call for help.

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Funded through private donations and grants from the state and federal governments, work on the trail has been ongoing since 2002. Nearly 12 miles of the trail have been completed thus far. When finished, it will cover over 20 miles of bicycle and pedestrian recreational paths that form a loop between Lawrence and Hopewell townships over public and private lands (such as the campuses of ETS, Bristol-Myers Squibb and The Lawrenceville School).  

Ken Weeks of Belleview Terrace spoke as a representative of the Rosedale Acres Homeowners Association, which is made up of the 32 families that live in the neighborhood. “We are very much, as a group, all 32 of us, in the same mindset that we have an opposition to the trail. Not so much to the trail itself – we think the trail is perfect, we think it’s a great idea – but we think from the issue of public safety, it’s not the right area to go through the Carson Road Woods… Our cops are great but if they were to stand there at the edge of the trail, they would never see anyone, especially at dusk,” he said.

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“My child right now is able to go around the block. She rides her bike. I have no concerns from that. Now we’re going to add additional traffic, additional strangers in the neighborhood. So we have concerns for our kids in that area,” Weeks said. He added that residents have already found “quite a bit of litter, beer bottles, [and] condoms” and are concerned about the trail bringing increasing numbers of strangers into the neighborhood who might engage in various “late-night activities.”   

“Where is the data that says this is the best route, where is the data that says the environment is not going to be harmed, where is that data that says from a public safety perspective this is the best place to put it and if someone is hurt the police and emergency services are going to be there?” he asked.

He suggested that instead of going through Rosedale Acres and Carson Road Woods that the trail instead continue along Rosedale Road to Greenway Meadows Park and Johnson Park School in Princeton Township and from there follow a route leading to Princeton Battlefield Park.

Weeks said many homeowners association members are new to the development, having only moved in within the last few years, and were unaware of the trail. Weeks’ wife, Ramona Schwab, stressed that point, saying “I’ve lived in the home for 5½ years. Not once, until late last year when we got a little, tiny flyer in our mailbox, did I even know that a trail was being contemplated that would require parking and signage on the street in which we live.”

But members of council and representatives of the trail later noted that the section of the trail proposed for Rosedale Acres has been well publicized since 2003 and several meetings have been held over the years with residents of that neighborhood and the areas surrounding Carson Road Woods. Lengthy discussions have also taken place over the years with Lawrence Hopewell Trail and the Friends of Carson Road Woods about the nature and route that the trail will take through the preserved forest and farmland.

James Goodman, a township resident for 43 years who lives in the 4300 block of Province Line Road, spoke out: “I am astounded to hear some of the things I’ve just heard. If you read the local paper and try at all to take part in the community and see what’s going on, it seems to me you ought to have read something at some time about the trail. A little bit of exploring on the web would certainly show you maps and other things. To hear that they didn’t even know this was going on is a little bit astounding to me.”

Goodman said his family and his neighbors support the trail. “We look at it as a great advantage. To have a trail that makes a circuit around the townships the way this one is planned and to have it go by your house seems to me to be a great advantage, not a disadvantage. I’d like to say in the strongest terms that I would hate to see an end come to the trail just because somebody didn’t want it in their neighborhood for one reason or another,” he said.

Anne Demarais, chair of the Lawrence Township Greenway Committee, similarly spoke in favor of the trail. “I would like to speak about sharing and how we all have to share,” she said. “These are township streets. We clean them. We all pay for them. And the people that live there sort of have to share them. And so do the people who live at the edges of Carson Road Woods. You’ve got to share it with the rest of us. Tonight we heard these 32 houses and the people that live there value their privacy and a quote was, ‘People will be using our trail and they don’t even live in our neighborhood.’ Yeah, that’s the point of it. We’ll be sharing. I hope somehow we’ll be able to share this wonderful park and streets that we all own.”

But John Busillo, a resident of Benedek Road for seven years, argued, “This is not a NIMBY [Not In My Backyard] issue. I didn’t grow up at Rosedale Acres. I grew up in a row home in South Philadelphia. It’s not something where it’s us against them. There are real security concerns. My kids are college age and out of college. My concern is not as much as the others. But if you have young kids… Remember, this is an enclave. It’s a different type of a neighborhood. As far as I understand, there are no other neighborhoods being affected this way. You’re talking about building a trail right through the center of this neighborhood. You’ve got security issues and real concerns about kids who are playing in the neighborhoods…. This is not an issue about sharing. It’s a public safety and a security concern in my mind.”

Peter Wood, of Lawn Park Avenue in the Eldridge Park neighborhood in the southern half of the township, noted, “We have a bike trail through our neighborhood. It runs alongside Johnson Village. And if you don’t know what Johnson Village is, it’s low income housing. We haven’t had the kinds of problems that you are afraid you’re going to have between Bristol-Myers Squibb and ETS. Maybe you a different kind of neighbor from the kind of neighbors we’ve got. I don’t know how else to explain it. But we’ve got a great trail and we’re hoping to expand it. I think once the [Lawrence Hopewell] trail is in place you’ll find out what many communities and many householders have found – they oppose the trail when it comes in and then when they go to sell their house they offer it as an amenity.”

Wes Brooks, chief financial officer for Lawrenceville School, spoke with regard to the Rosedale Acres residents’ worries about the safety of their children. Noting that Lawrenceville School has over 500 students from 33 states and countries who reside on campus, he said: “We’ve had the trail going across our campus for six or seven years now. The trail has posed no problems for the school at all. The trail runs immediately behind the dormitories for our 10th- and 11th-grade boys and immediately behind the dormitories for the 10th- and 11th-grade girls. There has not been a single incident from the trail in the history of the trail being on campus. I just wanted to confirm that, in our view, there is no safety issue with regard to the trail.”

Richard Rogerson said he and his wife moved into their home on Bellevue Terrace in January after looking at about 150 houses in the “Greater Princeton” area during a period of six months. “One thing I don’t think people understand is that different people value different things. Rosedale Acres community is an enclave community. It’s the defining characteristic of the community that there’s a single road coming in, with no thru-streets. That is one of the defining reasons why we live there. We looked at all of these houses and we chose to live there for the very simple reason that that community offers a great deal of seclusion and privacy. To put a public pathway right through the middle of the community changes the entire nature of the community. The people who are living there have chosen to live there because of these features. To take an action that destroys the defining characteristic of the community is unconscionable… I really request that before any action be taken to destroy this community that somebody does something careful in terms of analyzing what’s at stake.”

Susan Jason of Benedek Road said, “You come into our community and we have a T-junction. Are we going left on the trail or are we going right on the trail. And guess what. You can actually go around and around and around our neighborhood. So I envision these families riding their bikes [saying] ‘Let’s go around again! Why even go to Carson Woods. We can just go around and around.’ And we do have people already going around and around our community… We already have the Princeton bicycle club racing around our community. So the last thing we need is a marathon of people gawking at our homes, looking at us, and riding around and around our community.”

Eleanor V. Horne, a Dix Lane resident who is co-president of the non-profit Lawrence Hopewell Trail Corp., began her time at the podium by offering some background about the trail.

“We have been working to make the Lawrence Hopewell Trail a reality since 2002. Our goal has been to develop a safe, family-friendly community amenity. From the beginning, we raised money to build the trail. We have raised money to endow the maintenance of the trail. But all along what we wanted was a way to connect our communities [of Lawrence and Hopewell] and to really be a wonderful gift to the whole Central Jersey area,” Horne said.

“We have had a variety of meetings with township residents to benefit from their input and address their concerns about the trail. Until the very last inch of the trail is built we will continue to have those conversations about the nature of the trail – how to maintain it, how to use it, how to make it safe. On a number of occasions we have met with the residents of the Carson Road Woods and Mya Drive areas to discuss their concerns and to include their perspectives in our decision-making. We did this because we see the trail, again, as a community amenity – a project that enriches the entire community, not just the people who are fortunate enough to live directly on the trail.

“In no way do we take lightly the concerns of the members of the Rosedale Acres Homeowners Association. They care as deeply about their neighborhood as we care about the entire community of which they and we are a part,” Horne said.

She went on to cite property sales studies that, she said, show that property values in Rosedale Acres will likely increase because of the presence of the trail and she said there has been no evidence of increased crime near the sections of the trail that are already completed. She assured residents that trail signage would be minimal and make use of existing poles and that a sign could be installed and notices posted on the trail’s website urging trail users to park their vehicles at the Carson Road Woods entrance or on the ETS campus.

“Members of council, we believe that we can address the concerns of the members of Rosedale Acres Homeowners Association. We have asked to meet with them again to discuss the trail – a trail that will run on public streets and through a public park. We believe that the end result will be the ability to move forward with a project that does not impact them negatively, while benefiting them and indeed benefiting the entire community because of the many benefits of trails.

“Trails make our communities more livable, they provide access to open space, which the township has spent millions [of dollars] preserving. They reduce vehicular traffic, and they provide opportunities for physical activity to improve fitness and mental health. They also provide a way for young people to have safe recreation and to move from one part of our community to another. We believe the Lawrence Hopewell Trail is truly a community amenity and we hope to be able to convince our neighbors in Rosedale Acres that it is an amenity for them as well – in fact it’s an even greater amenity to them because they have the good fortune of living so close to it,” Horne said.

Becky Taylor, a Hopewell Township resident who is also co-president of the trail, also spoke: “I just want to point out a couple of things for accuracy. This really isn’t a trail to nowhere. It started out as a loop. We wanted to be very disciplined that we had a trail that connected to itself over a 22-mile area through Hopewell and Lawrence townships. But we now have connected with the D&R Greenway over on the Lawrence side. And now you can go from our trail all the way to Maine or to Florida. We hope, eventually, on the Hopewell Township side to connect with the Washington Crossing area and go along that canal as well. So this trail can actually take you to some pretty cool places…. For the record, there was an environmental study that was done for the Carson Road Woods area…

“As Eleanor said, we are happy to work with those you who are concerned about the impact of the trail in your neighborhoods. We respect your opinions. We think you should be heard. We think we need to work with you to try to address whatever your concerns are. Again, our goal here is to do something that’s good for the community… Our goal is to try to finish the trail in 2012. Maybe that’s ambitious, but we’re working really, really hard to do that… The parts of it that are open, we’re constantly getting feedback that people are very appreciative of all the hard work that’s been done,” Taylor said.

Lisa Lavery, a resident of Lawrence Road (Route 206), also voiced her support for the trail. “I’ve been a Lawrence resident since 2002 when we moved from Switzerland, where bike trails are very well established and very well traveled. So when we moved here I was very much excited to learn there was a trail project in progress and I joined up as a volunteer. People say there are no bikers in our area of town. It’s true because there are no sidewalks. There are no shoulders on the roads. To ride on Route 206, to ride on Province Line Road, to ride on Carson Road is pretty much to take your life into your own hands. I have two children. We chose to live in this area of town – I understand that. But for people to say [the trail] wouldn’t be used, I think is inaccurate. Because I know in our family, we would definitely use it. The children down the street from us would use it. I think it’s an important thing as we grow our community and look for ways to get our kids active. It would be really nice if they could hop on the bike and go out. So I think the trail is a wonderful asset to our community and it’s a way to get our kids out and our people connected.” 

After all those who wished to speak were given the chance, Mayor Greg Puliti addressed the crowd: “I certainly appreciate all the comments tonight. I know this particular part of the trail has been on the conversation table for a very long time. So I’m going to ask the LHT to reach out one more time to the Rosedale Acres community. I’m also going to ask the council to place this as an action item on the agenda at the next council meeting.”

After hearing feedback from the requested meeting between trail representatives and Rosedale Acres residents at their next council meeting on April 5, council members will vote whether or not to support the proposed trail section through Rosedale Acres, Puliti said.

“Back when I used to be sitting out there instead of up here, it used to annoy me when I would come to talk about something and nobody up here would tell me what they thought about what I was talking about,” Councilman Bob Bostock told the audience from his seat on the council dais. “So although it would probably be wiser for me to say nothing tonight, I’m going to remember what it was like to sit out there and share with you my thoughts on this tonight…

“When I joined the council in 2008 one of the first things I heard about was the proposal to put the Lawrence Hopewell Trail through Carson Road Woods. I started speaking with members of Carson Road Woods at that time and we had a lot of conversations about it. I thought a lot of their concerns were legitimate. And over the past several years I think those concerns have been addressed… I think a lot of give-and-take and compromise has gone into it. And I think we have gotten it to a pretty good place with respect to the plans for the trail right now.

“I think that it’s important when we have open space – and I know there are philosophical disagreements about this – that open space be accessible to the public. The public paid for it. It ought to be accessible to them. There are certain very sensitive areas environmentally where you don’t want the public going through, but Carson Road Woods does not meet that criteria. Certainly there are environmental concerns but those have been looked at and addressed,” Bostock continued.

“I will tell you, frankly, that I am not persuaded that directing folks to walk along a public road for three-tenths of a mile to come out of Carson Road Woods and hook up with the next thing poses a huge threat to public safety or traffic or any of those things. I’d be really surprised if people were going to start driving en mass into that neighborhood and parking to go into the trail, particularly when there’s parking at the other end of Carson Road Woods. I would maintain that it’s impossible to prove a negative. And if anybody has data that shows that crime increases as a result of a trail like this I’d be very open to seeing it… I’m not aware of any problems that anybody else has had where the trail already exists… My view at this point is that, absent of some good data or studies that show us that directing people to walk along a public street for three-tenths of a mile is a problem, I don’t see any reason at this stage to stand in the way of completing this section of the trail,” Bostock said.


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