Plan to Connect Route 9, Western Boulevard Moves Forward

Years of talk about extending Western Boulevard to meet Route 9 in Berkeley Township as part of a new town center proposal are turning to action, with Ocean County’s freeholders hiring an engineering firm Wednesday to look at the proposed route and design.

“We’re moving ahead,’’ said Freeholder John P. Kelly minutes after the freeholders hired PB Americas Inc., of New York City, to act as its consulting engineer on the project for $549,998.

Western Boulevard now dead-ends at Northern Boulevard in Pinewald. It’s extension would create an effective bypass of congested Route 9, a two-lane highway, through Bayville, providing a more direct north-south route than the current route through Beachwood.

Freeholder John C. Bartlett Jr., the senior freeholder, who lives in Pine Beach, said he favors a connection of Western Boulevard at Mizzen Avenue and Route 9, but wants “a commitment from the state to widen Route 9 at least to the (Garden State) Parkway,’’ before the county moves to extend Western Boulevard.

State Department of Transportation officials have been reluctant for years to dualize Route 9 south of Lakewood citing the expense involved. As a result, a series of county roads, New Hampshire Avenue and Old Freehold Road in Toms River and Barnegat Boulevard in Barnegat, have been used to handle traffic that otherwise would be on the state highway.