“We have a massive parking problem,” Councilman Jeffrey the hothead Voigt said Monday. “We are short over a thousand spots on weekends.”
Ha ha ha, Voigt. Really? There are upwards of 1,000 cars roaming up and down Ridgewood Avenue on Saturday night looking for parking? Come up out of your basement where you post incessantly on the blog…..and take a look at the downtown on Saturday nights Voigt. There are plenty of parking spaces, plenty. People repeatedly report this, post pictures of spaces, and yet you say there are 1,000 cars unable to find a parking space. This, ladies and gentlemen, is what you get when you elect a pathological liar. Fooled a lot of you, didn’t he?!
Not one of the current or former council members have ever stated publicly why they think that the new apartments are good for Ridgewood. These developments are just causing more issues for our already stretched budget and resources.
Last summer, we were forced to obey restrictions on watering our lawns due to a water shortage. Because I followed the rules, my lawn died. What will happen when the water demand is increased because of these new apartments? why is this good for Ridgewood?
why is this good for our schools? (my child’s class class size is close to 30)
why is this good for people who walk or drive through our town? (it is already congested)
why is this good for anyone besides the developers?
WHY DID WE LET THEM IN?
Ridgewood NJ, We are just two days away from our 2018 Gala, and we are definitely feeling the love in the air around us! We can’t wait to share our full concert version of Trial by Jury, along with other Gilbert & Sullivan favorites, with you all!
Help Ridgewood Gilbert & Sullivan celebrate the beginning of their 2018 Season at our annual Gala!
Sunday, February 11 at 3pm at Twin Door Tavern (122 W Pleasant Ave, Maywood, NJ)
Since our Gala is so close to Valentine’s Day, we will be celebrating love in the works of Gilbert & Sullivan. The afternoon will feature a full concert performance of Trial by Jury, which takes place in a world where breaking off an engagement in a crime that can be tried in court! The Gala will also feature love songs from other Gilbert & Sullivan operettas, sung by our all-star cast of company members.
General admission tickets are $25 each, and for $40 you can get a ticket and a full buffet lunch/dinner! A cash bar will also be available at the venue.
Ridgewood NJ, “Fort Paramus”? believe it or not, there almost was. here’s the design submitted to Washington after the British raided the American outpost there repeatedly in 1780. Paramus church is at the center of the main fortifications with outerworks extending to the north and east above the banks of the Saddle River; cross the ravine that Rt 17 now passes through, and coming back in front of the house in front of the church, all to control the approach and bridge in the low ground in front of the church. It could just as well be called “Fort Ridgewood” since that’s where it would have been.
Wyckoff NJ, The Wyckoff Police Department is investigating a Hit & Run / Pedestrian Struck: accident that occurred at approximately 7:10 pm on Saturday, February 3, 2018 near the intersection of Clinton Avenue and Wyckoff Avenue. The victim was crossing Clinton Avenue when he was struck by a vehicle traveling west on Clinton Avenue. The victim sustained non-life threatening injuries and was transported to Valley Hospital in Ridgewood, NJ.
Witnesses stated the vehicle in question stopped to check on the victim and then continued westbound on Clinton Avenue. The vehicle is described a dark colored SUV, being operated by a male party, mid 20’s, and wearing a New York Mets hat.
The Wyckoff Police is seeking information from anyone who was in the area at the time of the crash. Anyone with information should contact the Wyckoff Police Department at 201-891-2121. All information will be kept confidential.
Ridgewood NJ, the Ridgewood Police report that on February 4, patrol units responded to 8 Godwin Avenue on a report of an assault in progress. Upon arrival, patrol located both parties which were involved in the physical altercation. Neither party wanted to sign criminal complaints and both refused medical attention at the scene. While investigating the incident, one involved party was found to have an active warrant for arrest out of North Arlington, N.J. so officers arrested the 19-year-old male from Glen Rock, N.J. The North Arlington Police were notified and the arrestee was later released on his own recognizance after a new court date was provided.
Ridgewood NJ, at last nights council meeting Village Engineer Christopher Rutishauser gave an update on the Village of Ridgewood ‘s Complete Streets Program.
“A complete street is a transportation facility that is planned, designed, operated, and maintained to provide safe mobility for all users, including bicyclists, pedestrians, transit vehicles, truckers, and motorists, appropriate to the function and context of the facility.” The idea is to take into account pedestrians, cars and bicycles as well as beauty and ADA requirements .
Councilwoman Bernie Walsh commented that the Village and Citizen safety have to do a better job at disseminating problem areas and what the Village’s response will be to address those problems.
Readers often comment on the poor conditions of the roads in town , Walsh felt that if more residents were informed on what’s going on and why it would help alleviate some confusion.
Wait, so the argument now is… because a previous council approved the building of condos, in order to “save” the Village we need to appease the developers and build a garage for them given that they will obviously not have the needed parking spaces for their new tenants….and if we don’t build this thing, this town will become a glorified Rt 17 strip filled with gyms, banks and more condos? Come on people…..let’s all assume they build this thing, how does that change anything in terms of the parking landscape in this town? Yes, commuters will use it, yes shoppers will use it, but lets be realistic, probably only those looking to shop on Broad St or very close to it. We all know that everyone in this town or those that come here want to park right across the street from where they’re going, as stated in many of the posts before, if you look for parking you will find it, but you may have to walk a bit. So the taxpayers of this town should spend millions of dollars to alleviate a problem that may or may not exist for two to three hours on Friday and Saturday nights?? Do the math, it doesn’t add up and with Uber that problem is going away. Let’s spend money on updating the current run down parking lots we have or reconfigure current parking lanes and see how that goes….what’s the downside? We need to stop looking backward and look forward….Uber and Amazon to name a few are changing how we live our lives….less brick and mortar, less cars being driven for nights out….that’s the future, not building a garage that maybe in 1990 there was a solid argument for.
Paramus NJ, A five (5) vehicle, Thursday morning, 02/08, crash on Route 17 southbound near West Century Road in Paramus resulted in multiple injuries and snarled traffic on Route 17 in both directions. Paramus Police responded along with Paramus EMS and mutual aid ambulances from The Valley Hospital and Holy Name Medical Center. All five (5) vehicles involved in the collision required tow trucks to remove them from the highway.
It seems that very few people can even think of a realistic reason to build the garage. Add to Ridgewood taxes so people in other towns can park near the station? Provide extra parking for the builders who refuse to supply what is legally required? (How are they getting by with that, anyway? Did they change the town rules about how much parking is required for any construction? Or do they think their building permits do not require adequate parking? Council, the doctor on Broad Street has plenty of parking and has been struggling for several years to be able to use the 210 building which she owns. Why do outsiders get by with every single thing they want?) This building on Hudson doesn’t do anything for Ridgewood residents, except taking away a large part of the parking for Mt. Carmel’s activities. Two decks might help in separate parts of town but no-one is going to walk from Hudson to Oak, much less further. The only beneficiaries will be the commuters and the apartment dwellers, and for that Ridgewood must have higher and later parking fees as well as an astronomical increase in our taxes? At least the schools benefit OUR children. How will that garage benefit any of the residents?
Ridgewood NJ, surprisingly there were actually 66 towns in NJ where property taxes actually went DOWN. According to NJ105 radio , while the Village of Ridgewood had a 2.80% property tax increase from 2016 to 2017.The were however 8 towns in Bergen County that lowered property taxes , none of them bordering Ridgewood.
RIDGEWOOD VILLAGE
2017 avg: $17,667
2016 avg:$17,181
Change: 2.80%
Ridgewood NJ, the Ridgewood Historical Society is looking for sponsors for its next exhibit . Next week the official poster is off to the printer. There is one more week for businesses to join our sponsors to be listed on this poster and other promotional materials.
Join the Ridgewood Historical Society by supporting this exhibit and our mission to provide a place of historic artifacts, history and education to our local schools and families right here in Ridgewood. To sponsor The Thread of Life exhibit, please call 201-447-3242 .
NEW BRUNSWICK NJ, this poll and others continue to inadvertently report on voter disconnect . While New Jerseyans worried most about taxes and economic issues , they voted for Phil Murphy who campaigned specifically on raising taxes .
2018 RUTGERS-EAGLETON POLL STATE OF THE GARDEN STATE REPORT:
New Jerseyans are in a malaise these days when it comes to the Garden State: they are angry about the state’s economic climate, and even though they still rate the state positively as a place to live, they are mostly pessimistic about the direction the state is headed. While the vast majority love the neighborhood they are living in, a sizeable number of residents – more than in the past – say they would like to move somewhere else. These are some of the main findings from a Rutgers-Eagleton Poll late last year, as detailed in the newly released “2018 State of the Garden State” report.
Nothing upsets New Jerseyans more than the way their state government has handled taxes: 82 percent of residents say they are dissatisfied – 60 percent, alone, are “very” dissatisfied – with how the government has managed the issue. Three quarters say the same about cost of living and government spending.
“In a state that ranks near the top when it comes to outbound migration and taxation, it’s no surprise that New Jerseyans are upset with how state government is handling important financial matters – most of all, taxes,” said Dr. Ashley Koning, assistant research professor and director of the Eagleton Center for Public Interest Polling (ECPIP) at Rutgers University-New Brunswick. “It will be a challenge for Governor Murphy to balance fulfilling those of his campaign promises that require new resources with citizens’ current dissatisfaction with taxes and the high cost of living in the state.”
Yet despite grave financial concerns, New Jerseyans clearly like living here. A majority of residents continue to rate the state as an “excellent” or “good” place to live – though these ratings are down from where they once were prior to 2004.
However, in homage to the long-standing tradition of home rule in the state, the closer one looks, the better home looks. Residents rate the neighborhoods they live in better than their towns or cities, and they rate their municipalities ahead of the state as a whole. But when asked to compare New Jersey to most other states, residents are once again lukewarm: three in 10 say New Jersey is a “better” place to live, with about the same number each saying it is “worse” or the “same” as other states.
Results are from a statewide poll of 1,203 adults contacted by live callers on both landlines and cell phones from Nov. 15-27, 2017. The sample has a margin of error of +/-3.0 percentage points. Some questions reported in this release were asked of a sub-sample, resulting in approximately 600 respondents and a margin of error of 4.3 percentage points. Interviews were done in English and, when requested, Spanish. To read the full report, click here.
Life in the Garden State not so great?
Residents’ itch to move out of New Jersey has grown in the past decade – from 22 percent in March 2010 to now 30 percent. Forty-six percent want to stay exactly where they are and continue living in their current neighborhood, a double-digit drop from when the question was last asked almost eight years ago. Six percent now say they want to move somewhere else in their current town, and 15 percent want to move elsewhere within the Garden State. Millennials are one of the biggest flight risks for New Jersey, with more than a third wanting to move out of the state entirely.
Yet despite an increase in those who want to leave the state, residents continue a longtime pattern of being more positive than negative about New Jersey as a place to live – 61 percent (“excellent”/”good”) to 39 percent (“only fair”/”poor”). Yet this is a notable drop-off from how residents rated quality of life at the turn of the century and for decades before that, with ratings frequently surpassing the 70-percent mark for most of the poll’s history.
Residents are much more positive when it comes to their towns and especially their neighborhoods, however: 70 percent say the former is an “excellent” (26 percent) or “good” (44 percent) place to live, while 79 percent (38 percent “excellent,” 41 percent “good”) say the same about the latter. These patterns have remained steady throughout the past several decades.
But even though a majority of New Jerseyans like where they live, they don’t necessarily think the Garden State is the best around. Twenty-nine percent say New Jersey is a better place to live than any other state, 28 percent say it is worse, and 31 percent think it is the same as everywhere else. Residents have been increasingly more likely to say New Jersey is worse than other states in the last decade and a half, with the number who say so today almost triple what it was back in 2001.
Widespread dissatisfaction with state on finances; residents most positive on environment, education
Dissatisfaction pervades other financial areas of government beyond taxes: three quarters are “very” or “somewhat” dissatisfied with how the state has handled cost of living and affordability, as well as government spending and the state budget. Almost two thirds are dissatisfied with what the state government has done for New Jersey’s cities and urban areas.
Satisfaction with how the government is handling taxes does not pass 30 percent for any demographic, with most groups rating their satisfaction as somewhere in the teens or single digits. Not a single demographic reaches the 50-percent mark on satisfaction with New Jersey’s cities and urban areas, cost of living and affordability, and government spending and the state budget.
In contrast, residents are most satisfied with how the government is dealing with air and water quality in the state, as well both higher education and K-12 public education: about six in 10 are “very” or “somewhat” satisfied with each of these items. Over half of residents are also at least “somewhat” satisfied about the job the state government is doing with public safety and crime, as well as business and employment opportunities.
Residents are more split, however, when it comes to transportation and infrastructure. They are also mixed when it comes to how the government is managing issues like senior citizen services, Superstorm Sandy recovery, programs for the poor, and mental health and addiction.
Ridgewood NJ, Ridgewood water is looking to purchase a new water smart software ,the idea is to create a customer portal to offer better customer service and on demand access to customer account information . While we applaud Ridgewood water for moving into the 20th century ,maybe even the 21st century, issues were raised as to the cost ,integration and maintenance of the system . The mayor cleared up a few things when she realized there were some errors in the draft documents the Village made available to residents .
Mayor Knudsen ,” VC is providing “sunshine” binders allowing unprecedented access to DRAFT documents in the spirit of transparency. Typically there are errors and omissions in DRAFT documents and those are corrected before the public meeting when adopted by resolution. No different in this instance. I immediately noticed the errors and made notes for the Village Manager and Director Calbi. My meeting notes reflect a considerably lower cost based on a three year contract while the draft resolution shows the one time setup cost lumped with the total for the 3 year contract.At the right price the analytic software will provide valuable information and help with conservation efforts.I’m always happy to answer questions and going forward will have ALL binder documents marked as DRAFT. ”
What concerns us is the data collection bills have been know to be inaccurate . If Ridgewood water collects inaccurate data then the ability of the analytics will be compromised . This goes to the root of the problem . Ridgewood Water once again redirected the conversation toward consumer conservation , yet still no word on where the water is going to come from for all the high density projects going up in town.
