Asbury Park OKs 130 apartments, but neighbors fear traffic will be a nightmare

ASBURY PARK - The City Council approved a redevelopment plan to construct a five-story residential building consisting of 130 apartments, 20% of which would be set aside for affordable housing, as well as ground-floor commercial space on a vacant piece of property between Fourth and Fifth avenues on Memorial Drive.

The adoption came after residents voiced their concerns about the traffic impact. Neighbors want the entrance and exit on Memorial Drive, a major north-south commercial road, instead of either Fourth or Fifth avenues, east-west roads that are more residential. Numerous residents also expressed the need for affordable housing in the city and clarified that despite their criticism of the traffic, they support that element of the project.

Deputy Mayor Amy Quinn, Councilwoman Eileen Chapman, and Councilwoman Yvonne Clayton voted to approve the redevelopment plan while Mayor John Moor and Councilwoman Angela Ahbez-Anderson voted against it at the June 26 city council meeting.

The council also voted to give the planning the power to decide whether to allow an additional entrance on Fourth or Fifth Avenue, or both. If the planning board recommends it, the council will move forward with a new ordinance to adopt the revision to the plan.

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Quinn explained over the last three four years several traffic studies have concluded the same thing — that Memorial Drive is the least viable option.

"Memorial gets anywhere from 8,000 to 10,000 cars on it, and Fifth doesn't get that and Fourth doesn't get that, but Memorial is basically a highway of 10,000 cars a day," Quinn said.

"We have this independent traffic (professional) that said Memorial is the least good option," Quinn said. "So when this moves forward, I think this council is open to Fourth and Fifth, but I am concerned about Memorial when I have four people with some sort of degree beyond mine saying it is concerning to do it on Memorial."

Eric Galipo, 47, who has lived in his Asbury Park home since he was 8 years old, told the council he is a member of the American Institute of Certified Planners and he works as an architect, planner and a designer. He said "the traffic counts don't mean anything" and pushed to move the entrance to Memorial.

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"I guarantee you there is a safe way to design a driveway on a street that at its worst condition shows 250 cars moving north and 250 cars moving south in an hour. There is a street design that can support this outcome," Galipo said. "I don't think you should be asking us to choose between who gets it worse or better or if we divide it equally among us. We should be working to minimize the impact of that development on all of us."

Resident Mike Sodano said "you can't ignore the impact 130 units are going to have on the neighborhood."

"The numbers just don't work. Where are they going to be parking? They are going to be parking on Fourth, Fifth, Memorial, Langford, everywhere they can park. You know what those streets look like now. So you're just going to (have) people circling all day long for parking," Sodano said.

"If the traffic guy says entrances have to be where they have to be, well then there's too many cars, so there's too many units," Sodano said. "You can't tell me the only way to get affordable housing is to have 130 units on Memorial Drive, Fourth and Fifth Avenue."

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Galipo said he supports affordable housing.

"We need more people, we need people living here, in our businesses, sending their children to school, being part of our community," he said. "We want every person and we want every affordable unit that is in this development."

But he criticized the impact this development could have on the east/west divide in the city.

"It is not something to just be good enough, this is something we get to do one time. One time only, forever, and it is gaslighting us to suggest it is impossible to design a site with a single driveway on a block 300 feet long, with a speed limit of 25 miles per hour, and that is because we decided it is good enough," Galipo said. "Treating Memorial Drive like it is a bypass to Main Street, which is what the plan is doing, only reinforces the east/west divide."

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A previous plan called for 126 units in a four-story complex . The additional four units in this revised plan account for the shape of the building changing from a U-shape to a donut shape.

The four proposed penthouses would be located on the fifth floor, because from the developer's perspective, those units are needed to support the 20% set aside for affordable apartments.

The current redevelopment plan would see one 437-square-foot retail establishment facing the corner of Fourth Avenue and Memorial, another 500 square feet of retail space in the middle of the project on Memorial, and a third 926-square-foot retail space on the corner of Memorial Drive and Fifth Avenue.

Charles Daye is the metro reporter for Asbury Park and Neptune, with a focus on diversity, equity and inclusion. @CharlesDayeAPP Contact him: CDaye@gannettnj.com

This article originally appeared on Asbury Park Press: Asbury Park OKs 130 apartments, but neighbors fear traffic will be a nightmare