EDITOR:

It’s too narrow to provide for safe passage of any vehicles that may approach in opposing directions.

The road cannot support emergency vehicles, ambulances and fire equipment, not to mention snows plows and salt spreaders. These services are vital to the residents of the area. Must we wait for a tragedy before we bring this road up to decent standards?

Hardscrabble narrows in one of the more dangerous locations to a mere 16 feet. And that’s on a curve. An outcropping of rock that protrudes into the roadway at that point has already caused numerous accidents, destroying tires and rims.

So dangerous is the road, that last year at a Borough Council meeting, a letter from school children on Beverly Drive was read conveying their fear at riding the school bus on Hardscrabble. In fact, they were so afraid of riding the bus to and from school, that they “feared for their lives.”

I agree with Alice Steinbacher and her co-signers that Hardscrabble is a beautiful and scenic road. However nothing I heard indicated that the improvement would change that. There would be no curbing nor streetlights. It would remain a rural country road. But it would finally be safe.

What’s more, the improvements would solve a host of problems caused by the deteriorated state of the road. There are “open drainage pits” filled with debris, some as much as four feet deep, causing another hazard to pedestrians, and broken pipes which redirect the drainage away from its intended path. This picks up silt and more debris and carries into Indian Brook, a Class C trout stream, and ultimately into Dreesen’s Pond. Ironically, Bernice Dreesen was one of the Oct. 20 letter signers.

Properly engineered improvements will not only cure this problem, but will also comply with the state’s new Stormwater Management Regulations, something the borough is required to do.

Much misinformation has been spread by Steinbacher and her co-signers. But I attended the council meeting on this issue. The beauty and the rural character of Hardscrabble will not change. What will change is that we will have a safer and more environmentally friendly road.

And to what extent will this primary circulation road be “widened”?

3.5 inches.

3.5 inches more pavement standing between the safety of our children.

3.5 inches more pavement to create an environmentally sound road.

Just 3.6 inches… and the opposition of a few individuals who don’t seem to understand that Hardscrabble Road belongs to all the people of Bernardsville, not just to the eight who signed the Oct. 20 letter to the editor.

LIONEL M. LEVEY
140 Hardscrabble Road
Bernardsville

 

©Recorder Newspapers 2005