file photo by Boyd Loving
“To my fellow residents what the hell is going to happen another 3 to 5 years in the village of Ridgewood with all this expense. The services are not the same they are dwindling little by little. All village departments are short on staffing. Yes we have great school system great police fire EMTs sanitation recycling do a great job but come on, the village Ridgewood It’s not what are used to be. It’s no more Village it’s turning into a city”
photo courtesy of Ramon Hache
the staff of the Ridgewood blog
Ridgewood NJ,The crane at the Hudson Street Garage construction site is up. You will begin to see the assembly of the vertical panels today.
“Even the architects of the garage said that the facility will not pay for itself so the Village would have to raise both street and lot parking substantially to help meet its costs. They also said that the lifetime of the garage would be 20 years as long as it was maintained regularly. Does this kind of attitude cause a huge smell wafting over it? This, along with all the NOT “needed’ other projections the Council and School Board think are VITAL will bankrupt the Village even before the economy starts turning down.
The aroma of “accidental misstatements–and outright lies by the builders throughout town” must smell like quality perfume to our “Movers and Shakers” as they will be surrounded by it for years unless they conveniently “move out” once they’ve shaken the town for all their personal needs as well.”
“When i go for my daily walks with the dog on recycling days, the majority of the houses of piles of ‘amazon’ boxes at the curb which is a clear indicator of where the residents have been shopping. I haven’t bought anything in the CBD for years except to get my watch battery replaced at town/country or an evening meal/drinks. Retail is dead and dying and the pay-to-park just gives it another kick in the ass. The only need for parking is 3 or 4 hours on Friday/saturday nights unless you’re willing to walk 4 blocks, in which case there is always parking. This was nothing but ‘plum’ given to the developers in town so they have parking for their massive apartment buildings, and parking for the patron’s of their tenants restaurants. There should be ‘impact fees’ on these apartments in addition to real estate taxes since they are the prime beneficiary of the garage. We should have let NJ Transit build a garage at their expenses on the Ken Smith property. too late now. RIP good old Ridgewood. Hello ‘Montclair East’. SAD”
“Many of the towns and their lifestyles are being destroyed. People are lulled into sleep and their eyes glaze over even when they are pointed in the right direction. They refuse to accept they are being manipulated or deceived.
Agenda21 has been out there for a while but people have forgotten the impact A21 wants to make upon living conditions, their family and lifestyles.
Read: https://www.democratsagainstunagenda21.com/
“We believe this is not a good thing for the village. Down the road in a few years what’s going to happen if the economy sinks for a bit like in the past .and no one is shopping and we are back to having 50 or more stores boarded up .the town will look like a ghost town. It was very depressing looking Back then when that happened.who will be responsible from the top. Or will they all be replaced ,and again they will go after the little small time worker and lay them off because of financial crisis. Pretty much all village departments are short on staffing as it is. And now with recycling Revenues toppling down it’s actually costing the village to do recycling versus making money like in the past. Recycling department is a losing proposition. Yes it’s a law but at who’s cost the taxpayer again. Just like the parking garage unnecessary.Wake up fellow village taxpayers. This parking garage is not for the taxpayers it’s for out-of-towners pretty much that are coming here to park close to the restaurants . End of the story. Every Thursday Friday Saturday Sunday there are plenty of parking at the lower level of the CBD meaning By Ridgewood Ave., Maple Village Hall parking lot ,give me a break. If you went to New York City you would walk a few blocks , This is about lazy people. You take your family into New York City and you park in a parking garage , and how many blocks do you usually walk to the place you’re going. Right. This is a poor investment. This is not going to be a money maker .about time this thing is paid off it will probably will need to be Heavily repaired. Unless they keep on top of it every single year which that’s not gonna happen.”
the staff of the Ridgewood blog
Ridgewood NJ, Truly Sichuan is pleased to announce their annual Chinese New Year Party Menu attached:
CHINESE NEW YEAR FOOD TASTING 12-COURSE MENU
(Tea Tasting Included)
Sunday 02/02/2020 4pm-9pm
$75/Adult; Prepayment Required; BYOB; Free Parking
Continue reading Truly Sichuan, Chinese New Year Food Tasting 12-Course Menu
the staff of the Ridgewood blog
Ridgewood NJ, according to Village Manager Heather Mailander , there will be a parking rate increase on February 1, 2020. The new rates will be $1.00/hour in the lots and $1.25/hour on the streets. The rate increase is necessary in order to pay for the construction of the Hudson Street Garage.
Continue reading Village if Ridgewood Parking Rate Increase February 1st
“It’s depressing. Unfortunately when residents who lived here for decades leave, their houses are bought by NYC families who never experienced the quaint village feeling before. So they don’t even know it and they’re fine with a city feel and look as long as they have a gazillion rooms and a small yard. They bring their mindset with them and turn the whole place into a cold and unfriendly environment with their big city attitude. To add, they’re also the biggest supporters of feel good causes but they’re fine with cutting their yard trees so they won’t have to deal with leaves or they will b!tch and m0an about blue laws cuz they can’t shop on sundays. They’re fine with large buildings around them because they’re used to them. Nobody will protest when Valley site turns into an apartment complex. The look and feel of suburban towns is being destroyed by this generation who also has a herd mentality when it comes to local or national politics. Those of us who wanted a pleasing, quaint, quiet and friendly place to raise our family are the real victims. We are stuck here until we can retire. Every nice area is being exploited and used and abused to extreme.”
the staff of the Ridgewood blog
Ridgewood NJ, New Jersey Business & Industry Association CEO and President Michele N. Siekerka, Esq. issued the following statement in response to the New Jersey Fair Workweek legislation announced today.
“The point is that none of our councils, including the current one, have stood up to fight these problems.
Worse, they have never really spent the time to deal with these issues head on and try to find creative solutions.
They could support litigation with other towns against these proposals. They could figure out a way to satisfy the obligations in the meantime, such as by designating one site for purely low income rather than 10% of numerous sites. Then, you would have had one site with 35 units rather than 4 sites totalling a couple of hundred. They could focus on the fact we had hundreds of beutiful apartment buildings, catering to a wide range of incomes, and we didn’t need to build shoddy units on top of the rail road tracks.”
“I got out last year as I viewed this as having an enormous impact on Ridgewood’s quality of life and various other factors that will gradually decrease property values.
Maybe a lot of Ridgewood’s “specialness” was realtor hype, but there were things about Ridgewood that made it a cut above similar towns in the region.
If you plan to stay in Ridgewood, then I predict that come time to sell your home, you will not get what you thought you would and the days of selling Ridgewood houses in a couple of weeks are long gone.”
the staff of the Ridgewood blog
Ridgewood NJ, Ridgewood Mayor Ramon M Hache points out some ascetic and safety updates in the CBD ,”You may have noticed work being done on the tree wells throughout the downtown. We are removing the brick bands which were a tripping hazard and car door nuisance. Most importantly, they were an impairment to the trees by diverting water and limiting the amount that irrigated the soil.”
Continue reading Ridgewood Central Business District Trees Get Update
the staff of the Ridgewood blog
Ridgewood NJ, the retail chain Gap has shuttered two locations in New Jersey as part of a larger store-closing purge. 700 Paramus Park in Paramus and 235 East Ridgewood Ave. in Ridgewood are now closed . The chain still operates 28 Gap stores in New Jersey.
“Don’t any of you realize the state of New Jersey. An and would force us to permit this type of construction or worse? Like them or hate them it is quite irrelevant who is in the town politics. It is our state courts from decades of liberal judges that have been forcing these stupid developments. The reason they are building giant apartments on top of train track is because the state has set tax incentives to do so : see Waldwick station and Allendale etc. The state of NJ thinks this will fight global warming (seriously). Also the developments are being forced on us ever since the mount olive decision in the 80s. See this as an example:
