The Teaneck Council meeting on September 14th was a study in contrasts.
On the one hand, Deputy Mayor Mark Schwartz reported on the occupancy rates at three recently constructed apartment buildings located at 1475 Palisades Avenue (Teaneck Square), 1775 Windsor Road (Avalon Teaneck), and 1500 Teaneck Road (One500 Apartments).
Deputy Mayor Schwartz stated that all three complexes are “fully occupied,” And that One500 Apartments has a “seven-month waiting list”!
To the Council, Teaneck Township is thriving!
On the other hand, during Good & Welfare, one Township resident after another reported on the devastating impact of the vast flooding caused by Hurricane Ida, especially on one of the areas most severely damaged by Ida’s flooding: Belle Avenue, a major gateway onto and off Route 4, the town’s umbilical cord to New York City.
A Belle Avenue resident told how his basement was destroyed and his two cars totaled. This resident proposed that just before the next storm, Council members should move into his basement and see what it feels like to have your house inundated. He also proposed opening a kayak launch on Belle Avenue and suggested that Governor Murphy come to Belle Avenue for his next disaster tour. He urged the council to regrade the street and repair and upgrade the sewers and drains along Belle Avenue before he and his neighbors hire a lawyer and sue the Township.
Another long-time Belle Avenue resident made clear that the flooding on his block is but the tip of the iceberg, that flooding occurs along Windsor Road and many intersecting streets, and that the Township has been aware of this for a decade or more.
Yet another Belle Avenue resident reported on the years of flooding he has endured and suggested one alternative – stop taxing repeatedly flooded residents if the Township can’t provide the essential sewage and drainage services.
Belle Avenue and the surrounding areas were not the only parts of Teaneck to be affected by Ida. A New Bridge Road resident brought up the apartment building recently erected at 764 New Bridge Road, a development called The River Commons. The resident, who said he lived in the last house in Teaneck before entering New Milford, told the Council that before the River Commons developer dug into the hillside and built the apartment complex, he had no flooding; now, he has 5-6 feet of water in his basement when storms hit.
It is unknown if any part of River Commons flooded - this development is not occupied, having yet to receive a Certificate of Occupancy.
The West Englewood Avenue underpass was also totally submerged, and the water destroyed the underpass’s interior lighting and wiring. The underpass was out of action for several days.
Ida also flooded the Votee Park area along Palisade Avenue and judging from the high-water marks on the grounds around the Fieldhouse, came within a couple of feet of our $3 million investment.
At the end of the meeting, Fire Chief Zaretsky joined via Zoom to read a prepared statement about his department, but also noted that the Fire Department had rescued many residents from cars and basements all over the Township during Ida.
Finally, in his closing comments, Deputy Mayor Schwartz promised to address the Belle Avenue flooding but warned of the “sticker shock” to follow. His comments highlighted the study in contrasts of the entire meeting: The Council warning of the significant costs of safety, security and the maintaining of habitable dwellings, while the residents are still reeling from the sticker shock of the almost $3 million spent on the Fieldhouse and the $4-5 million soccer field that is almost always locked tight.
This past weekend, Paul Mulshine, a columnist for the Star Ledger, wrote an
interesting piece on flooding and declining infrastructure. Mr. Mulshine spoke to former Bogota Mayor Steve Lonegan who operates a restaurant in Hackensack.
Mayor Lonegan described the flooding in Hackensack, which sent sewer manhole covers flying. He pointed out that drainage systems in older cities – like Hackensack or Hoboken or Teaneck – carry both sewage and storm water. These older systems can’t handle the volume of water to begin with, but now Hackensack must deal with its own apartment house building boom.
Mayor Lonegan observed: “I don’t even know how you add these [new apartment] buildings to this system. The sewers are 100 years old.”
Mayor Lonegan makes an excellent point. Just like Hackensack, Teaneck’s Council and our Council-appointed Planning Board and Board of Adjustment have been re-zoning to encourage the construction of new apartment buildings. These new buildings, with thousands more residents, are connected to Teaneck’s old sewage and drainage systems, systems that are already overburdened.
In addition, each new building increases impermeable surfaces, thus reducing the capacity for undeveloped land to absorb water. In other words, each new building adds more volume and greater demand to the Township’s outdated sewage/drainage systems.
Of course, every developer that comes to Teaneck hearings arrives with a lawyer, engineers, designers, and assorted experts, all of whom assert that our drainage and sewage systems can handle the increased runoff and sewage that every new structure generates. Few, if any, have conducted studies to assure these statements are accurate
Rather than boasting about occupancy rates and waiting lists, Teaneck’s Council should be prepared not only to answer the complaints of angry residents wiped out yet again by water cascading into their yards, cars, and basements.
It is time to stop all development in the Township until the Council invests in a thorough assessment of the sewer and drainage infrastructure, and repairs and replaces what is causing this massive flooding of our town.
It is worthy of note that Avalon Teaneck has a special emergency exit leading from the complex to Windsor Road built at the insistence of the NJ Department of Environmental Protection to give the residents of that housing complex a path to escape from flooding!
So, the next time the Council majority wants to report on occupancy rates at newly constructed apartment buildings, residents should bring the conversation back to Hurricane Ida and future flooding that will soon follow. See, Report Warns of Catastrophe over Warming, NY Times, September 18, 2021, p. 1.;
UN climate report a ‘red alert’ for the planet.
Yes, Teaneck does need affordable housing. But undeveloped land, like the low-lying 0.6 acres along Englewood Avenue, should remain undeveloped to promote flood resiliency and avoid stressing our overburdened and aged sewer/drainage systems.
It is time to draw a straight line from overdevelopment in the Township to our sagging infrastructure to climate change and those flooded basements and totaled cars on Belle Avenue. It’s time to deal openly with these climate-related changes and put our dollars to best use – restoring our infrastructure and planning for the future.
