The Franklin Reporter & Advocate Eight Villages, One Community
A contingent of Princeton Highlands residents showed up at the July 8 Township Council meeting to ask for the Council’s help in getting traffic lights installed at the Route 27 intersections with Princeton Highlands Boulevard and Goldstar Drive.
The answer, however, was not what they wanted to hear.
The Princeton Highlands Blvd. light would be for automobile traffic, while the Goldstar Drive light would be for pedestrians.
The state Department of Transportation has determined that traffic signals are justified at those intersections. That’s not formal approval, however. Traffic and other studies would have to be conducted first.
And the main stumbling block, based on comments made by Township officials, is the cost.
Princeton Highlands resident Shubhendu Singh spoke for the group.
“It’s been a longstanding issue that our community has raised, and I must add, without much progress,” he said. “We continue to see accidents and near misses on a daily basis. It is a ticking time bomb.”
“DOT has recommended this and you’ve seen a lot of notes from me personally to several stakeholders, but the recommendation is, from DOT, and our ask is, that you convene a meeting with the appropriate stakeholders including South Brunswick, obviously our township, DOT and others so we can have a conversation and come up with a pragmatic and expedient plan that defines timelines, next steps and how we’re going to fund this project,” Singh said.
Township Manager Robert Vornlocker estimated the cost of the lights to be about $500,000, 25 percent of which would have to be contributed by Franklin and South Brunswick Township, because Rt. 27 lies in both towns.
“We have had correspondence and communication with South Brunswick, and they have said in no uncertain terms, while they would not oppose those signals, they will not be contributing financially to those signals,” Vornlocker said.
Council Member Ed Potosnak said that another option would be for the state to shoulder the entire cost of the project.
“That’s correct,” Vornlocker said. “You put it in their capital plan and my assumption is that if it gets approved at the state level for inclusion in their capital plan, that could mean that a traffic signal would be, my guess, sometime between five and 10 years out before it went into design and the full engineering of it at that level.”
Mayor Phil Kramer said that another option would be for the Township to foot the bill.
“That option was offered to an apartment complex on Route 27 in Franklin Park, and it was also offered to a homeowners association during my tenure in the police department,” Vornlocker said. “So that option is also one that certainly could be considered as well. Clearly, that’s not going to happen here, but it is an option.”
Kramer said that he asked community members if the Homeowners Association would kick in money for the project, “somewhere between $100 and $200 a home.”
“The major benefit is to the HOA, and that’s why I thought that would be fair,” he said. “The other thing is the precedent … there are many communities that come onto Route 27, and if we put up a light for you without any cost from you, that’s a precedent. Others might be asking for that. So I asked you that, and I was waiting for an answer. And I offered to go before your HOA board or at an HOA meeting to discuss that.”
Singh had earlier said that the project was no an HOA issue.
“This is not about the upkeep and enhancing common areas of our community,” he said. “This is a public issue; safety.”
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