Landfill Solution for Bike and Pedestrian Safety
By Albert B Kelly
The older I get, the faster time seems to but if memory
serves, the first meetings that the City of Bridgeton had on capping the closed
landfill in City Park was in the summer of 2006. At that time, I was serving as
a member of City Council, and the former administration initiated discussions
with NJ DEP. The site had been closed for some time as an active landfill and
the issue over the last decade was how to permanently close and cap the
landfill in a compliant way and more importantly, how to pay for it.
It was no small issue because aside form the potential
environmental impacts, we’re talking about 28 acres of space in the middle of
City Park that served no function other than to provide a little fodder as
“Mount Trashmore” for some local gossip. It took far more time than I’d
imagined when I set out in my first term to pick up the threads of this project,
but with some hard work on the ground and some excellent guidance and
assistance from NJDEP, the process of closing and capping the landfill began in
earnest in July of this year.
After clearing was completed, a 1-foot thick layer of low
permeability fill material was compacted into place over the entire 28-acre
site. This was followed by installation of a six inch layer of top soil that was
then fertilized and seeded, along with erosion control matting, which will
increase soil stability and help new vegetation grow. All told, it took 3,000
loads of gravel/clay mix and 1,100 loads of top soil- a heck of a cap indeed.
While this may seem a minor point, I think it is important
to rebrand the site in a way that is consistent with public use and enjoyment.
Toward that end, I hope to engage our students in the year ahead in a naming
contest to find a name and an identity suited to the site’s new role as a place
for recreation and fun. Let “Mount Trashmore” be a thing of the past.
In terms of an adaptive reuse, it will certainly be passive types
of recreation consistent with both the requirements of closing and capping and the
character of the site itself. One thing that stood out through the process of
clearing and capping the 28 acres was the variety and amount of wildlife that
called the place home along the spine of the Cohansey River. Whatever the final
product in terms of public use, it will do so with the animals and their
habitat in mind.
The most obvious reuse would be trails and sitting areas
carefully designed and implemented. This takes on greater urgency in light of
the research done by the South Jersey Transportation Planning Organization in
relation to pedestrian and bike safety planning in Vineland, Millville and
Bridgeton. Through their research, it becomes obvious that we have far too many
accidents involving pedestrians and bicycles.
In Bridgeton for example, from 2012 through 2016, there were
a total 114 bike and pedestrian-involved crashes (29 bike and 85 pedestrian) comprising
21% of Cumberland County’s 536 total bike and pedestrian crashes during that
period. Tragically, county-wide during that five-year stretch, 27 people lost
their lives, 17 were incapacitated, and another 100 had what were classified as
moderate injuries in such crashes.
If I read the research correctly, of the 23 top-ranked
intersections and corridors for bike and pedestrian crashes, six are in
Bridgeton and these included Irving Avenue, Atlantic Street, Grove Street,
Laurel Street, Commerce Street, and N. Laurel Street. Bridgeton’s top traffic
corridors for such crashes included N. Pearl Street, Fayette Street, Grove
Street, E. Commerce Street, and Irving Ave. The top intersections were found on
Walnut Street, East Ave, Atlantic Street (leading onto Mayor Aitkin Drive),
South Avenue, Manheim Avenue, and Southeast Avenue.
The South Jersey Transportation Planning Organization is
working on street modification plans to lower and eliminate such crashes which
accounts for their solid research. That said, I also think that providing safe
and dedicated spaces for people to ride their bikes and walk recreationally, at
least in Bridgeton, becomes urgent in light of those stats.
There is still much work to do including identifying funding
sources and solid planning, but reclaiming park acreage once seen as blight, nurturing
a wildlife habitat along the Cohansey while also providing a safe alternative
for bikers and walkers- that’s no small thing.