Office building gains OK from Marlboro planners
BY VICTORIA HURLEY-SCHUBERT
Staff Writer

MARLBORO - After more than an hour of listening to residents voice concerns about traffic and safety issues, the Planning Board on April 18 approved the construction of a three-story office building on Hartman Road.

The building, to be owned by Marlboro 18 LLC, will have 92,125 square feet of space with frontage on Route 18 and on Tennent Road.

"Tennent Road is like a Route 9 bypass," said Bob Rosenbaum, a 15-year township resident, during the public hearing on the application. "I'm concerned this building is going to impact traffic."

Plans call for more than 380 parking spaces for the office building on the 12.5-acre parcel. The site is bordered by Route 18, Route 520, Tennent and Hartman roads. Traffic access to the site would be from Hartman Road, which has caused much anxiety for area residents.

Hartman Road is the exit road that carries traffic from Route 18 southbound to Route 520. Traffic at the intersection of Hartman Road and Route 520, which does not have a traffic light, frequently backs up as motorists wait to make a left or right turn onto Route 520.

Adding a right turn lane to Hartman Road is part of the approval, in addition to road repairs, said Marlboro Councilwoman Patti Morelli, who sits on the Planning Board, after she explained that a light was denied at the intersection of Hartman Road and Route 520 by the state Department of Transportation because that location is too close to other traffic signals in the area.

There is a traffic light at the intersection of Tennent Road and Route 520, several hundred feet east of Hartman Road.

Residents of Alexander Woods, a housing development near the site where the office building will be constructed, expressed fears that their already congested neighborhood would become gridlocked.

"Anyone who has traveled this route knows it's a horror," said Richard Victor, who has lived in the development since 1994. The residents in Alexander Woods only have one exit from their development, to Tennent Road.

More than one person expressed concern about emergency vehicle access to the area due to potential traffic congestion.

"It's unnerving to hear the siren and not see a truck," because it may be stuck in traffic, said Joanne Vanderwheel, a Hartman Road resident for more than 30 years.

The Robertsville Fire Company is on Route 520, about a half-mile west of Hartman Road, and the Morganville First Aid Squad headquarters is on Tennent Road, about a half-mile north of Route 520.

The waiver-free and variance-free application received unanimous approval from the board after Dennis Collins, the board's attorney, explained that the board members could not deny an application because of traffic concerns.

"The board members are not ignoring safety ... they are acting within their parameters," Collins said.

One resident, Herman Suarez, was concerned about the aesthetics of the new office building for Alexander Woods residents.

"I don't want to look out the window in the winter and see a building," Suarez said.

Collins assured him the developer would be required to provide visual screening with plants.