BOE Votes for Haddon Heights

Courier Post coverage:
Are Merchantville Students off to Haddon Heights?
Merchantville's School Plan May Face Challenge

Philadelphia Inquier coverage:
Merchantville Board Votes to Sent Students to Haddon Heights High School

The full study can be found on the Merchantville School website or you can view it via Scribd below:

Merchantville FINAL Feasibility Study

Merchantville BOE Study

The Merchantville Board of Education has conducted a study on sending high school students to Haddon Heights instead of Pennsauken. The findings of this study will be released at the January 10th school board meeting.

West End Update

From the comments section of the previous thread:

The Wellwood Manor purchase is settled. That building will be relandscaped and restored outside and in with a mind towards its historical character, down to its mosiac tiles, brass mailboxes and original two-piece intercom telephones in the foyers (decorataive, not functional).

You might have noticed already that in the same block as Wellwood Michael's Liquor Store has a new facade and attractive awning to match the one uptown on the PNC building.

Our Boro has agreed to allow the two vacant store fronts between Wellwood and the liquor store to open as a grocery/convenience store. A tenant has already signed a five-year lease for that operation.

Down the street on the other side Pennsauken Twp approved changing the dry cleaning storefront now empty 7 years into a residential apartment. The West End Task Force is working with Pennsauken and the N.J. highway department to block off the end of 43rd Street to make that street into off-street parking for that building.

Sprint has indicated it will include in its next five-year plan the closing off of 42nd Street and rehab of that little (blue) corner shop filled with Sprint electronics as part of a new landscaping design.

Down at the intersection with Rte. 130, the tenant of the yellow brick liquor storage building has expressed to the Task Force that he will erase the grafitti.

The West End Task Force applied for a continuation grant to complete its work in getting the vacant white Kawasaki building leveled and turned into parkland with a NJ Transit bus stop shelter along Rte 130.

Camden City has approved a new commercial zoning plan for the block from the liquor storage building (which the Task Force wants moved away from the intersection) down to the Dental building at Myrtle Ave.

Ragan Design Group is the planner that has worked on these changes for the West End. Ragan is the same planner who prepared Merchantville's Master Plan a few years ago.

Mixed Emotions

Kevin Riordan, columnist of the Philadelphia Inquier, does an admirable job in summarizing the events up to now and the countering views towards the merger study in our community.

Kevin Riordan: In Merchantville, mixed emotions about a merger



Happy Holidays to all!

Leave It Alone

The front page story of The Merchantville Observer notes that the days of raking one's leaves to the curb for collection are over. All leaves will have to be put into bags.

Is this just another case of paying more for less services or is bagged leaf collection the way of the world now?

Parking for TCE

A commenter brings up the question of parking for TCE, and as I scour the news for anything to take a break from the merger talk, I thought that it would be good to promote his or her comment to a discussion thread:

There is some concern being expressed around town recently that the proposed Fieldstone redevelopment project to go on the Town Centre East triangle will have parking on Chestnut Ave., Park Ave. and Centre St. I do not see how Centre St. parking can be an issue. Those few spaces have been given away to stores and apartments above so many times that telling the Fieldstone residents they will be able to park on Centre is the same as telling them they will have a full moon every night to light their way.

Park Avenue? That is a different story. Fieldstone proposes to widen Park Avenue to especially create 14 spaces. The 14 will replace the existing 4 spaces which no one in his right mind would park in overnight because the road is so narrow. Widening the road is a great idea. So is adding ten more spaces. And the trump card is the possibility that another ten spaces could be added to the other side of Park after it is widened. So we could end up with 24 usable spaces both day and night.

Chestnut Ave? My bet is that Chestnut along the triangle would be full every night whether or not there are enough spaces for every Fieldstone resident inside the triangle. Why? Two reasons. The first is because 2-car families have to park behind each other, bumper to bumper. I did a midnight walk a couple of weeks ago to sample parking on Chestnut Ave on both sides of Centre. I noticed along S. Chestnut between Alexander and St. Peter's Chestnut parking lot, that 2-car families having a single-width driveway (all of them) park the second car in the street rather than behind the first car in the driveway. So, projecting that behavior, I predict that the Fieldstone condo owners facing Chestnut Ave. will opt to put their second vehicles on Chestnut rather than stack park their 2 cars one behind the other in the triangle. Instead of saying, "Honey, would you move your car? I have to leave early this morning" he will peck her on the cheek and whisper, "Gotta go. See ya tonight late." He then runs out the front door instead of the back door.

The second reason comes from seeing west of Centre towards Alexander that N. Chestnut residents park on Chestnut across from their houses filling the street even though the Boro parking strip on the R/R right-of-way 30 feet from them remains empty. So if the Fieldstone residents living in the condos facing Cruiser behave in the same way, Chestnut Ave will fill first because it is more convenient to come and go from the front door.

What's the big deal with the Chestnut parking complaints anyway? Only 5 cars park there at night now, mostly down at that triplex near Gilmore.

Let me note that a primary recommendation that the TCE Selection Committee passed on to Council was to use the earning from the sale of the PNC parking lots to finance the acquisition of the Verizon parking lot for public parking.

Hurricane Irene

The Borough government website, www.merchantvillenj.gov will be placing information about planning for the upcoming hurricane and emergency information for residents.

LFB Approves Commission Study Application

This afternoon the Local Finance Board of the Department of Community Affairs approved the dual application of Cherry Hill Township and the Borough of Merchantville for the proposed municipal consolidation. The vote was unanimous.

Separation of Church and Rate-ables

St. Peter's Church plans to demolish 82 W. Chestnut Ave to create more parking. There is a meeting next Tuesday August 9th at 7:30pm. What impact will this have for the area and the borough?. Will the additional parking space further exacerbate the current flooding problems for Chestnut Ave.? There is also a meeting tomorrow (8/2/2011) with the Historical Preservation Commission.