New policies aim to mitigate Route 18 traffic congestion
Archived article from Sep 6, 2004
By Richard Gorman
Rutgers will take advantage of a six-month delay in the $134 million Route 18 widening project in downtown New Brunswick and refine its plans to mitigate the unprecedented traffic congestion expected during construction over the next four years.
Beginning in March, the New Jersey Department of Transportation (DOT) will begin to widen a two-mile stretch of Route 18 from the Albany Street Bridge to Route 1. The DOT will create four express lanes and two access roads and eliminate the traffic light at Commercial Avenue. Plans also call for building new bridges at New Street and Commercial Avenue and improving the George Street ramp at Douglass College and the Albany Street and Route 1 bridges.
To lessen the impact on university operations, President Richard L. McCormick appointed a 25-person committee in January under the stewardship of Paul Leath, former chair of the department of physics and astronomy. After reviewing the university’s operating procedures, the committee came up with a host of recommendations for new policies that would keep Rutgers functioning efficiently as construction progresses.
Karen Kavanagh, executive vice president for administrative affairs, is reviewing 50 recommendations the committee presented in its report to McCormick shortly before the end of the spring semester. Kavanagh has appointed three implementation committees, drawn largely from the president’s Route 18 Widening Committee, to institute those measures that would exert the greatest impact on curbing traffic and easing the administrative burden on students. Many of the recommendations, which range from creating dedicated bus and bicycle lanes on local roads to increasing classroom space on the Cook, Douglass and Busch campuses, could become permanent.
Some of the recommendations are already in place. Starting this month, students cannot schedule back-to-back classes that require them to travel between the university’s three local campuses: Cook/Douglass and College Avenue in New Brunswick, and Busch/Livingston in Piscataway. In addition, student services, such as admissions, parking, financial aid and housing, will be decentralized and “bundled” in a single location on each campus. All administrative offices will be open from 8:30 a.m. to 5 p.m., including lunch.
The committee divided its recommendations into two categories: those requiring negotiation with other entities and those that could be carried out by the university. It recommended negotiating with Middlesex County and city officials to name a point person who would advise on changing traffic patterns, adding dedicated bus and bike lanes, and banning most on-street parking near campus. And it urged talks with NJ Transit to operate more frequent train service to New Brunswick and to link the Edison and New Brunswick train stations with nearby campuses using shuttle buses. To further reduce the number of commuter cars, the committee recommended extending the university bus system into Piscataway, Highland Park, Edison and East Brunswick and to add more remote park-ride lots.
In addition, the committee endorsed enhancing the university’s video-conferencing capabilities on all campuses. Other recommendations include: staggered work hours, promoting the flextime policy, implementing new class schedules requiring less inter-campus travel, moving classes and exams to less busy times, restricting student parking permits and establishing a car pool matching program.
“We can’t implement all of the recommendations in one fell swoop,” Kavanagh said. “We have to stagger them because we don’t have the staff or the money.”
Leath said that while taking these steps could help, "This is a massive, intrusive project, and all we can do is to help at the edges.”
For information about the progress of construction and related traffic congestion, visit the NJDOT Real-Time Commuter Information Web page at www.state.nj.us/transportation/commuter/trafficinfo and click on “show construction events.” Information also is available at the Rutgers-related Route 18 Update Web site (route18update.rutgers.edu).
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