Once Upon a Time
By Albert B. Kelly
Once upon a time, way back in 1966, planning officials
kicked around the idea of the Mid-State Parkway which, if I read the old maps
correctly, would have run south through a portion of the state with an end
point in the western part of Cumberland County down near Sea Breeze. At the
southern end, it ultimately led onto a bridge that crossed the Delaware Bay and
fed into Kent County, Delaware. Looking back some 53 years, you can’t help but
wonder what it would have meant for growth and development in our county and throughout
this corner of New Jersey.
These days, when traveling out of state which often means
negotiating traffic to get onto either the Delaware Memorial or Commodore Barry
Bridge, you could be excused for thinking about how much time might have been
saved or how much easier it would have been if you could just head south for a bay
crossing as opposed to traveling north and west before going south toward your
destination. The idea of a Mid-State Parkway was never realized but for some of
us who are natives of this corner of the Garden State, the parkway and bridge
prospect just sits there as a juicy “what if” possibility.
As old as I am now, I was too young to care about or pay
much attention to discussions about a proposed parkway and bridge when those
discussions took place back in the early and mid-1960’s. But having recently come
across maps from the period that envisioned this proposed crossing as well as data
from 1980 looking at future need and capacity, I can appreciate the effort that
went into trying to balance what existed against what might one day be needed.
Forty years ago the conclusion was that the two existing
bridges (Delaware Memorial and Commodore Barry) would be able to handle
capacity through the year 2000 and for better or worse they have been our
options when traveling. The Delaware Memorial Bridge (DMB) opened in August of
1951 with a total of four lanes- two in each direction. A second suspension was
opened in September of 1968 which added four lanes for a total of eight (4 in
each direction).
If the numbers I’ve come across are reasonably accurate, in
1978 the average number of vehicles crossing the DMB was roughly 50,900 per
day. The yearly total came to some 18,578,500. Today, estimates place the
average number of vehicles crossing the DMB at over 80,000. How much over I
cannot say, but this would place the number of yearly crossings at somewhere between
30 million and 35 million.
As for the Commodore Barry Bridge (CBB), which opened in
February of 1974, the average number of daily crossings in 1978 was roughly
13,300 which translated into approximately 4,856,000 vehicles per year. Today, rough
estimates suggest that the CBB accommodates between 35,000 and 40,000 vehicles
per day which would mean that some 12.7 million and 14.6 million vehicles cross
that bridge each year.
It would be useful to know hard numbers in real time not
just for the bridges, but for the arteries and approaches leading to the
bridges. Part of the value in having a current snap shot is being able to take
this accurate real-time data and integrate it with historical data, allowing us
to project ahead with regard to growth trends, usage patterns, and whatever
else goes into such longer range planning.
In considering New Jersey’s future, there is room to grow,
but my guess is that much of that room is to be found in the south western
quadrant of the state. One goal when considering this future growth is to
strive for smart growth and by that I mean planning that accounts for agriculture
and open space along and how these are to be preserved or enhanced with
housing, commercial-retail, and light industrial growth.
Compromises would be necessary on all sides but even as I
say that, I’m already imagining where some of the battle lines would be drawn
whether it’s the status quo against change, rural against urban, or endangered
against unemployed. Such are the many competing interests. But no matter what, it
starts with ideas and a vision about what the future could be- infrastructure
and all. As we begin the third decade of the 21st century, those old
plans from the 1960’s may be a good way to start thinking about and discussing the
future.