Mobilizing the Region

The buying power of New Jersey's 10.5 cents/gallon gas tax has eroded over the years. Note: In 2009, the tax was equivalent to 5.8 cents/gal in 1988 dollars.

On Friday, NJ Governor Christie’s transition team released a sweeping review of state operations. Not surprisingly, nearly all of the key transportation issues facing the [...]

Stories from 2009: (clockwise from right) NJ broke ground on the Access to the Region's Core tunnel; Chris Christie was elected governor; NJDOT will increase the percentage of its road budget going towards expansion in coming years; NJDOT increased funds for pedestrian and cycling infrastructure in the 2010 capital budget; the state broke ground on a widening of the Garden State Parkway.

Despite budget woes, New Jersey recognized that it had to continue investing in transportation. The state broke ground on the Access to the Region’s Core tunnel connecting it and New York City, and increased the size of the 2010 capital plan for NJDOT and NJ Transit by 10% over the prior year’s.  But the state often invested in the wrong transportation projects. The NJ Turnpike Authority broke ground on widenings of sections of the Garden State Parkway and NJ Turnpike. NJDOT began to fund road widening projects to a greater degree than in the past and showed few signs that it was following its old smart growth philosophy. In November, former US Attorney Chris Christie, a Republican, defeated Gov. Corzine in the gubernatorial election, providing an opportunity for the state to rethink parts of its transportation policy.

NJ Department of Transportation

NJDOT displayed an admirable commitment to pedestrian and cycling infrastructure this year, releasing a capital budget for 2010 that increased funds for bike and pedestrian projects by 50% over the previous year. In the summer, the agency released grants from the new Safe Streets to Transit program aimed at making it safer to walk and bike to transit stations. In response to advocates, the department closed out the year by issuing an internal complete streets policy that requires projects to accommodate all road users, though numerous exemptions may render it toothless.

However, the year also saw road expansion creep back into the department’s agenda. The 2010 capital plan more than doubled the share of the road budget going to expansion, to 7.5%. Improvements to Route 1, originally planned as part of a smart growth and transit project, moved forward without an indication of whether smart planning principles will continue to be followed. Near the end of the year, NJDOT abruptly broke ground on a widening of Route 206 in Byram which had been opposed by community members for a decade.

The Route 206 widening was just one sign of a disheartening trend: The near-complete erosion of NJDOT’s smart growth philosophy. Few of the projects in the “NJ Future in Transportation” program, which was created in 2004 and linked transportation planning and land use planning, have progressed, and no new NJFIT projects were announced in 2009.

NJ Turnpike Authority

The Corzine administration continued its push to widen the Garden State Parkway between exits 30-80 and the NJ Turnpike between interchanges 6 and 8A, at a combined cost of nearly $3.5 billion. The state originally sought to use federal stimulus funds for the projects, but this proved illegal as the projects had not gone through federal environmental review. In February, TSTC filed suit to block the Parkway widening, as project permits had been granted without public notice and the study did not accurately assess current traffic numbers and future traffic projections, and did not address secondary impacts or alternatives to widening. The lawsuit survived a motion to dismiss in August and continues to make its way through the legal system, providing an opportunity for changes to be made to the project. However, the state broke ground on a section of the Parkway widening (between exits 80-63) in July.

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