Expert Says AvalonBay Won't 'Significantly' Impact Traffic At Intersections

Residents blasted an engineer Monday who testified that traffic at intersections near the proposed AvalonBay development would not be “significantly” impacted if the rental development were built on Totowa Road.

Due to the standing-room only capacity of the previous meeting, Monday’s meeting was held at Wayne Valley High School.

John Desch of JDA, a traffic-engineering firm, testified that that any increases in delay experienced at the traffic lights at the intersections of Riverview Drive and Totowa Road and Totowa Road and Valley Road could be corrected by adjusting the timing of the traffic lights at those intersections.

Desch used a GPS navigation program called Wayz to determine how he thought residents would travel to and from the proposed development. Destinations of New York City, Paterson, and South Jersey from the site and all routes point take a right and going east on Totowa Road, away from Wayne, and onto Route 80.

Residents disagreed.

Several residents testified that motorists would instead make a left and go farther into Wayne and routes 23 and 46 towards the NJ Transit park and ride station at the Willowbrook Mall and the NJ Transit train station on Route 23.

“Of the 50,000 people who live in this town, I guarantee that a small percentage actually use mass transit,” said Desch. A number of people laughed and gawked at the comment.

Resident John Hoffman showed on his smartphone that Google Maps tells motorists to go left towards Wayne if traveling to midtown Manhattan from the site. Desch said that Google Maps was not a factor in drawing conclusions for the traffic study.

Related: Experts Ignore Residents’ Questions Regarding Controversial AvalonBay Application

Board of Adjustment member William Van Gleson wants to see more information regarding the proposed financial and economic impact the proposed development would have.

Some residents, like George Pent, are concerned that the township would have to increase its fire department and that the public school system would be impacted by the development.

All of AvalonBay’s 422 apartments would be rental units. Of the 422, 336 units would be built in a four-story building and 86 townhouses would be spread out in 13 buildings. The application calls for 134 one-bedroom units, 228 two-bedroom units, and 60 three-bedroom units and about 930 parking spaces. The units would range in price from $1,600-a-month rent to $3,500.