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“As residents, are we not due that, that we have accurate data?”īoard attorney Peter Vignuolo said that the Board didn’t have the discretion to put off any action on the plan. “Does it not make sense to postpone this decision until an accurate traffic count can be done?” she asked. One resident, Veronica Avenir, insisted that the Board should postpone any action until a full traffic study could be conducted. He went out and found out what the pre-pandemic school use was, and that’s principally what’s generating traffic in this area.” Orsini said that Maltz “went above and beyond what he minimally had to do … and based his report on that with the full transparency that he couldn’t put a line in the street and do a traffic count. The library will also be closed on Sundays. Maltz also noted that the library will not open before 10 a.m., after students are in school, and will close after the students have left. “It’s not like somebody’s putting a supermarket in there, ” he said. He said his estimates showed that traffic volume created by the library branch would be “very, very light” and would have no effect on Baylor. Maltz then used statistics compiled by the Institute of Traffic Engineers trip generation manual to estimate the number of car trips in and out of teh library site. Instead, Maltz spoke to school officials about the amount of traffic in and out of the school during the mornings and afternoons. Orsini noted that the library trustees’ traffic expert, Harold Maltz, admitted that because the pandemic had interrupted school attendance, he could get an accurate traffic count along Baylor Street, which is used by cars and buses heading to Franklin Park School. The fact that the Board had no authority to compel the library trustees to do anything frustrated the objectors, who argued that a traffic study contracted by the library trustees was lacking data, and in light of that, the Board should postpone making any recommendations until after the Covid-19 pandemic has ended and a full traffic study could be conducted.īut that argument didn’t fly with Board members, including Board chairman Michael Orsini. The branch would replace one currently housed in space at the Franklin Towne Center, at the corner of South Middlebush Road and State Route 27. The library trustees want to build a 5,580-square-foot library branch on a 2.3-acre plot near the Franklin Park School. Under state law, the Board has no authority to approve or reject the plan. The Board was presented the plan by the library trustees for a courtesy review, as is the procedure when a public agency undertakes a development project. The residents, most of whom lived adjacent to the 2-acre plot targeted for the library branch, urged the Board to postpone its recommendations on the project until after the Covid-19 pandemic is over, and a full traffic study could be completed. The Board passed on its recommendations over the objections of a handful of residents who live near the Franklin Park site of the proposed library extension. The Franklin Public Library Board of Trustees should heed suggestions on its proposed southern branch made by the township Environmental Commission and planning department officials, the Planning Board recommended at its August 18 meeting. The landscape plan for the proposed southern branch of the Franklin Township library.
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