by Boyd Loving, photo by Boyd Loving
Ridgewood NJ, Village Engineer Christopher Rutishauser provided an update of the West Glen Avenue sidewalk installation safety initiative to Village Council members during their scheduled Wednesday evening Work Session meeting.
Despite concerns expressed by residents living on the south side of West Glen Avenue between Heights Road and North Monroe Street, Mr. Rutishauser informed members of the Council that sidewalks will be installed along that entire route. The concerns expressed by residents include:
the potential loss of off-street parking areas
a likely intrusion into existing front yard surface areas
the proximity of sidewalks to the traveled roadway
a minimal impact, if any, on the problem of speeding vehicles along West Glen Avenue
$50,000 has already been earmarked to begin the planned work. However, Council members were advised by Mr. Rutishauser that the entire project will likely cost significantly more.
This is great news!!!
I have been wishing for this to happen for years.
Making Glen Ave walkable will open up access to many: access to the bus stop at N.Monroe, to the tennis courts, Park Wood Deli, for students to walk to GW and Willard. This is the kind of action that we seek from our local government. Adding sidewalks to Glen Ave will make Ridgewood far more walkable for the neighborhoods divided by Glen Ave. Thank you Thank you Thank you!!! P.S. Don’t let the neighbors stop you like they did on Clinton, please!!
About time W. Glen Ave. is extremely dangerous to walk on. I don’t know why it took so long.
Yeah wait until the winter time when the plow trucks plow all that snow back good luck cleaning the snow off the sidewalk.
Just remember that’s a county road. For some reason we have a big problem in the Village of Ridgewood with county roads. I’ve been living on a county road for over 50 years and it’s in horrible shape. For some reason Bergen county doesn’t repave reconstruct Bergen county roads in the Village of Ridgewood. Well for at least the past five years. You look at some of the county roads in our town there in horrible shape , Especially my Block Ackerman Avenue.
The roads in this town, in general, are horrendous
yes.
Ridgewood USED TO get preferential treatment from state and county services (roads, police, post storm clean-up, etc) since we were a top tier town.
NOW we are at the back of the line told to pay-up, shut-up, and feel lucky when services eventually arrive.
And who’s running the show please what a joke.
So embarrassing lack of experience.
Re: West Glen Sidewalks. An admittedly minority opinion:
Now? No thanks. I have lived on the north side of West Glen for 40+ years. We raised three children here, all of whom went thru the K-12 schools. Yes, we taught them how safely walk on Glen and how to cross going to and from Williard.
We learned to tolerate the frequent daily police, fire and ambulance sirens as they rush to their emergencies calls. [We’re not at all pleased with the civilian “speeding rockets” that often fly by as they zoom both up and down the hill at all hours.] Backing out onto the road requires patience, and demands vigilance, as well as a speedy maneuver.
Yet, during these decades of learned tolerance, there have been two significant benefits — which I will now lose [“for the greater good?”].
1) There has been enough space to parallel park in front of my home, enabling us to avoid tandem parking which would have necessitated numerous occasions of “car jockeying” into the road to get the desired vehicle in and out of the driveway;
(2) There was no need for any shoveling of a public sidewalk. I only needed to clear the short walkway to my home.
So, you learn to make lemonade…it’s just a different flavor now.
How dare you?! Haven’t you seen, we have people who right here on W. Glen who have been denied access to the tennis courts and the scrumptious pizza at Parkwood … and the bus stop! Imagine needing to take the bus but not being able to walk there because there wasn’t a sidewalk. Do you think of no one but yourself!?!
Addendum:
Oops. I’m on the south side, not the north side. Hey, it’s only been 40+ years!
And you are a selfish curmudgeon that can’t even acknowledge this sidewalk is obviously needed and should have been there decade’s ago
Centuries, even! How many people have been trampled, I wonder, beneath the hooves of careless horsemen for lack of a sidewalk since our blessed village was incorporated in 1894.
That area of glen is unsafe for cars, not sure why anyone would want to walk there. It is likely the reason why everyone on that area gets driven to high school by housewives in nightgowns.