Jersey City and Ridgewood are the latest municipalities in New Jersey to adopt local Complete Streets policies saying that roads should be designed and built with pedestrians, cyclists, and transit riders in mind, reports NJ Future’s Jay Corbalis. There are now 12 municipalities with a local Complete Streets policy in the state, as well as Monmouth County. (Read Jersey City‘s and Ridgewood‘s policies on the National Complete Streets Coalition website.)

New Jersey DOT also adopted an internal Complete Streets policy in 2009 and has said that towns with local policies will get priority for local aid. Another good incentive would be for NJDOT to create a separate pot of funds dedicated for those towns. This could work in a similar fashion to the state’s Transit Village program, which provides money for projects exclusively in towns that have earned a Transit Village designation by committing to developing around rail and bus stations. (The Transit Village program, however, is at risk of being cut.)

NJ Future also highlighted a series of workshops for local advocates and officials interested in adopting local complete streets policies in their towns. The workshops are hosted by Sustainable Jersey and will take place:

• July 14 at Stockton College, from 1pm to 3:30pm (register here).
• July 19 in West Windsor, from 9:30am to noon (register here).
• July 21 in Rahway, from 6pm to 8pm (register here).