>Monday, January 28, 2008
BY BOB GROVES
A group of Ridgewood residents wants to make a change in village rules to help them thwart proposed expansion by The Valley Hospital.
Concerned Citizens of Ridgewood has applied to amend the village Master Plan and its hospital zone ordinance to “limit its impact on the community and preserve the village’s residential character.”
The group has also asked the village council and Planning Board to amend the ordinance to change the minimum distance — from the current 40 feet, to a proposed 80 feet — that hospital buildings must be set back from North Van Dien and Linwood avenues, on Valley’s borders.
Opponents have argued with Valley for months over its controversial $750 million plan to add an above-and-below parking deck, and replace two buildings with three new ones, increasing the hospital’s size by 67 percent.
Valley officials say the hospital needs to modernize to serve increasing numbers of patients. Opponents say Valley’s plan would encroach on the residential blocks on three neighboring streets, and Benjamin Franklin Middle School on the hospital’s north border.
The proposed new hospital buildings would tower 80 feet in a neighborhood of two-story homes. Construction would cause traffic, dust, noise and safety problems, critics of the project contend.
Concerned Citizens view their move to amend the village Master Plan as a preemptive strike against Valley which, they say, also intends to ask for ordinance changes that would permit its expansion.
“We beat them to the punch,” said Paul Gould, a member of Concerned Citizens who lives near the hospital campus. “This application we’ve launched is designed to use the law to preserve what we all hold dear in our village.”
Concerned Citizens supports Valley’s need to modernize to serve the local community, Gould said. “However, the scale of the proposed renewal is far greater than can be justified for this particular purpose,” he said.
The group has also charged that, when Ridgewood amended its rules in July to allow anyone to ask for changes in the village Master Plan, it was done to benefit Valley.
Valley’s renewal plans have received “overwhelming support throughout Ridgewood,” hospital officials said in a statement.
“We will continue to work with residents throughout Ridgewood as well as the surrounding neighborhood, to ensure that the hospital respects the character of our community, while providing the best and most advanced health care for our patients and their families,” the statement said.
The Ridgewood Planning Board is expected to acknowledge receipt of Concerned Citizens’ request for an amendment at its meeting on Tuesday, a spokesperson said.
E-mail: groves@northjersey.com