Date: Fri 27-Feb-1998

Publication: Bee

Author: CURT

Quick Words:

edink-sidewalks-Borough

Full Text:

Ed Ink: Where The Sidewalk Ends

A committee of borough residents was set up by the Borough Board of Burgesses

a year and a half ago to explore the possibility of completing the loop of

sidewalks in the center of town. The panel has come to the conclusion that

linking existing sidewalks on Main Street, Queen Street, and Church Hill Road

with new sidewalks on Glover Avenue and a portion of Church Hill Road will

help protect the many school children on the roads in the center of town and

enhance the overall ambiance of the borough. The committee will take their

conclusions to the Legislative Council next Wednesday, March 4, seeking

financial support. The case they make is compelling.

The safety issue the committee raises is legitimate. Every school day, more

than 1,400 students converge on the town center to attend classes at Hawley

School and the Newtown Middle School. Add to that the number of students at St

Rose School just down Church Hill Road, and it becomes clear that a

significant percentage of the town's children are within walking distance of

two major food stores, Grand Union and Big Y, and the town's premier

adolescent snack emporium, Dunkin' Donuts, at times when they are very hungry:

first thing in the morning, and after school.

Fortunately, Hawley and St Rose School carefully control the movements of

students off school grounds, but the kids at Newtown Middle School are more

independent and peripatetic before and after school, and their school sits

just at the point where the sidewalk ends.

The committee is also proposing a plan for financing the project that won't

raise taxes. The project is expected to cost $200,000. The borough itself

hopes to contribute $75,000 from its own treasury and from individuals and

businesses in the borough who would benefit directly from more pedestrian

traffic in the center of town.

On March 4, committee members will ask the Legislative Council to commit the

remaining $125,000 from LoCip funds, which are already available to the town

for capital projects but have yet to be allocated. Money is needed now to

conduct an engineering study to determine how best to thread the sidewalks

around slopes and trees. Also issues of maintenance and snow removal should be

addressed before design and construction begins. But if the project is to get

underway this year, a financing plan should be put in place soon.

It used to be that town centers would evolve according to the needs of people.

Homes, meeting places, stores, churches, and schools would grow up side by

side, reflecting the demands and the tastes of the community. It seems that in

recent years, the prerequisites of people have been overrun by the

prerequisites of motor vehicles. With the current construction of the Route 25

bypass road through Fairfield Hills, the redevelopment of the Newtown Shopping

Center, the renovation and expansion of the Booth Library, and the continued

vitality of churches, schools, and every other human enterprise in the Borough

of Newtown, the time is ripe for people to take back the streets.

The members of the borough's sidewalk committee are currently collecting names

on petitions in support of their proposal at various locations in and around

the center of town. Add your name to the list of those urging the Legislative

Council's support for this proposal.