Community Corner

Parkway Widening Reduces Natural Barrier for Local Residents

Office of Sen. James Holzapfel working to get answers from Turnpike Authority

Before Jerry Roselli put a 12 foot fence up along the back of his property on Todd Road in Toms River, he could not hear his wife call out to him while he was working in the backyard. In Brick, some residents have to hold family parties in their front yards.

These are some of the issues homeowners are facing as the expansion of the Garden State Parkway continues. The project was said to increase shoulder width, remove obstructions, improve sight distance and reconstruct the roadway between mile markers 83 and 100 in both directions.

“I literally now live on the parkway,” Margie McMahon of Parkway Drive in Brick said following a meeting with a representative from the office of Sen. James Holzapfel and Assemblymen Dave Wolfe and Greg McGuckin.

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The senator’s office has taken on the cause to assist residents in getting answers from the Turnpike Authority.

Residents of both Toms River and Brick have fought to have a sound barrier installed upon the reconstruction of the parkway to diminish the sound, keep wayward cars from landing in their backyards as well as Parkway drivers from knocking on their doors upon breaking down and prevent pollution.

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The senator’s office began hearing from homeowners in the beginning of February, Chief of Staff Glenn Feldman said. Feldman would forward the letters to the Turnpike Authority and get answers for the residents.

Feldman has heard mainly from Brick homeowners but residency and the stories have varied, including a pregnant woman who can’t sleep at night while construction is underway, he said.

According to a public hearing record from the Turnpike Authority, written comments were sent from residents of Brick, Toms River and Wall.

The Parkway, an 'extension of the Turnpike'

On Wednesday, Feldman met with a group of Brick residents to discuss the matter.

“These people just lost their sound barrier,” Feldman said. The majority of the forestation had been taken down.

“There is a plan for replanting,” he said, adding that shrubs as well as 6 to 7 foot trees will be added. He was told reforestation would begin this spring, but it’s already May.

“If we could speed it along, we would. It’s horrible. The noise is tough,” said Feldman, who drove through the area before and after the trees were taken down to experience the sound change himself. “It’s a big difference from when the trees were up.”

Roselli of Todd Road in Toms River began his efforts to have a sound barrier installed in November 2011. He wrote a petition and got 80 signatures.

He had requested a sound test from Todd Road but the Turnpike Authority had performed one on Herkimer Road in Brick and another on Lakewood Allenwood Road in Wall, he said. The sound tests were performed prior to the widening from 3 to 6 p.m. and 6 to 9 a.m. but were several hundred feet from homes and not in the vicinity of tollbooths or exits.

Trees were taken down up to Roselli’s property, he said.

“They literally do what they want,” he said.

Roselli got approval from the Turnpike Authority to put up a 12-foot fence, which is higher than the township zoning board permits. The fence cost approximately $5,000.

“You’ll hear the difference in the noise,” he said of the areas of his property with the fence and without.

“We went from a beautiful Parkway to an extension of the Turnpike,” he said, calling the roadway “ugly.”

A safer, not louder roadway

Both Toms River and Brick residents were told their neighborhoods do not qualify for a sound barrier.

“The Turnpike Authority can’t ask toll payers to foot the bill for sound barriers every time someone decides to build or buy a home near a busy toll road,” said Thomas Feeney, spokesman for the Turnpike Authority.

When improvements are made to the Parkway or Turnpike that could increase noise in a neighborhood, the Authority studies the noise impacts and determines whether a sound barrier would be an appropriate remedy, he said.

“That is not what’s happening in Toms River and Brick,” he said. “No new lanes are being built. Traffic is not going to increase.”

The Parkway widening project will create wider shoulders and travel lanes, but it’s being accomplished by adding road surface in the median, not by widening the roadway toward the residential areas, Feeney said.

“When the construction is complete and the road is restriped, the travel lanes actually will be located six feet farther away from the homes than they are today,” he said. “The Parkway is going to be a safer roadway when this work is done; it’s not going to be a louder roadway.”

A letter from Project Engineer Maynard Abuan dated July 27, 2011 indicates that the sound analysis found that existing noise levels are within the 66 decibel threshold. 

In that same letter, Abuan stated that the project required "limited clearing." Additional schrub pines, which provide "limited visiual screening," were removed in order to relocate and reinstall ground mounted signs and guidrail.

It was also noted that the Garden State Parkway is eligible for listing in the National Register of Historic Places, and noise walls would be considered an "intrusion," having an "adverse effect on the character" of the Parkway Historic District.

The Parkway project does not qualify for sound barriers, Feeney said. But the Authority has made some accommodations to address the concerns raised by residents.

The sections of the Parkway near Todd Road and other neighborhoods will be paved with open graded-friction course, or “quiet pavement,” which will provide a three to five decibel reduction in tire noise, he said. This pavement is not typically used on the Turnpike and Parkway.

Additionally, after some Todd Road residents raised concerns about trees being cleared to make way for a stormwater basin near their properties, the Authority obtained approval from the Department of Environmental Protection to remove the basin from the plans and divert runoff to a basin at a different location, Feeney said.

“Now, I’m like living on the parkway,” said Pete Hess, another Todd Road resident. Before construction began, he couldn’t see the parkway through the forestation.

The letter from Abuan said the Authority will look at planting trees with a low canopy as long as the buffer would not conflict with the "safety and clear zone enhancements" being implemented as part of the project.

No hope for sound barrier

Roselli still intends to fight for a sound test from Todd Road and hopes one will be done during peak hours, he said.

But it’s not just a matter of noise, residents of Toms River and Brick agreed. The smell of exhaust pours into their backyards. Animals that used to live in the wooded areas are now on their property. Soot covers windows of the homes and cars. Cars that left the roadway have struck trees just behind their homes.

Roselli has had to help numerous people whose cars have broken down. Some have attempted to steal gas from his garage, he said.

The Authority does plan to put up a chain-linked fence along the Todd Road area, which would help keep cars and people out of their yards, but that won’t prevent the noise and pollution, he said.

“I don’t want to hold a lot of hope for it,” Roselli said of a sound barrier.

McMahon has moved on from a sound barrier, doubtful they would ever win at this point. She just hopes the replanting will get done.

“They were allowed to remove so much forest that protected our homes,” she said. “The wall is the only thing that would help but they’re not going to give us a wall because no one is fighting for us.”

Jill Sluka and Michele Spector of Brick would like to see even a temporary sound barrier until the new trees grow.

John Sluka of Silvia Court in Brick said the residents of the neighborhood could now wave at those who lives across the parkway.

“I don’t want to shut down construction. I want a consequence for [the Authority's] lies,” he said. “It’s noisy everywhere. The noise from motorcycles and trucks is incredible.”

Now Brick residents are relying on the senator’s office, McMahon said.

Feldman encourages homeowners to keep writing the senator’s office, and he will maintain contact and continue to work with the Turnpike Authority.

“When you’re a homeowner, you really have to rely on the legislature. We’re not powerful,” she said. “If this senator doesn’t take up the cause then nothing will be done.”


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