2 New Left Turns Coming To Hooper Avenue In Toms River

TOMS RIVER, NJ — Raise your hand if you've done this: You've just finished dropping $100 at Target on stuff you probably didn't need and now it's time to head home. Home is south, down off Route 37. So you head to the exit at Target's end of the shopping center, wait for a gap in the traffic so you can scoot across two lanes to go left at the light into the Michael's shopping center. When the light changes, you pull into the plaza and then make that quick-but-tight U-turn and hop on Hooper Avenue south.

This, of course, is not a legal maneuver. But if you've shopped regularly in the area, chances are you've done it at least once, just to avoid going north to Indian Hill Road and deal with the confounded jughandle to make the legal left onto Hooper Avenue southbound. And if you were coming from the north,

Sometime next year, you won't have to do that anymore because in the land of jughandles, officials have decided that two new left turns will make more sense.

The Ocean County Board of Freeholders have approved a plan to put in a new traffic signal on Hooper Avenue between Ocean Center and the Commons at Hooper. Ocean Center is home to Petco, Lowe's and Target, while the Commons at Hooper has DSW (Designer Shoe Warehouse), Michael's and a host of smaller stores.

The median will be opened and the new traffic signal will allow motorists to go left in either direction, as well as allow direct access across Hooper Avenue between the two centers, officials said.

That means those leaving DSW won't have to drive down to Bay Avenue to take the jughandle there to go north any longer. And if you have errands that include stops in both shopping centers, it'll be a little more convenient to spend your money.

The county's engineering department has developed a conceptual plan for the project, and the county has hired Dewberry Engineers of Bloomfield to formalize the plans, officials said. The county expects the design to be completed by the end of the year, with work commencing by the spring of 2018.

The move was proposed by Freeholder Director Joseph Vicari and Freeholder Virginia Haines.

"This change will provide full access to Hooper Avenue," Vicari said. "This is good for motorists and good for business."

A news release from the Ocean County Board of Freeholders said the owners of the two shopping centers support the change as well.

"This is a heavily traveled area of the Hooper Avenue corridor. We believe this change will have a positive outcome with traffic safety and accessibility," Freeholder John P. Kelly said.

"The new traffic light will allow motorists to leave the shopping centers and head in the direction they choose without having to make U-turns," Haines said. "We are very pleased these changes will be made in the near future."

Photo shows the middle exit from Ocean Center, facing the Commons at Hooper. The median will be opened and a new traffic signal put in to allow left turns onto Hooper Avenue. Photo and map via Google Maps