TRADING SPACES
Take parking spots to make room for extra traffic lanes

Tuesday, July 10, 2007
By LYSA CHEN
JOURNAL STAFF WRITER

When Hudson County added new traffic lanes at the intersection of Secaucus Road and Kennedy Boulevard, Henry Checo, owner of an auto repair shop at the busy intersection, lost more than parking spaces.

He lost business. "Big time," he says.

Jersey City, Union City and North Bergen, which border the crowded intersection, lost 15, 12 and three parking spaces, respectively, to new left-turn lanes in late April, Hudson County spokesman Jim Kennelly said.

Some of the 30 lost parking spaces were in front of Kennedy Auto Repair, where Checo parked his customers' cars when his garage was full.

Now, however, he has to park them two blocks away, and if a vehicle can't be driven, Checo said he has to pass on the job when the shop's driveway is already full.

"If I park it two blocks away, I have to pay for another tow truck to bring it to the shop, so I have to lose that business," he said.

The new lanes - which expand Kennedy Boulevard at that spot from four to six lanes - were added at North Bergen and Union City's request to ease congestion and improve pedestrian safety in the area, Kennelly said.

"Governance is a constant balancing act," he said. "No doubt parking is at a premium, but what the county heard from municipal officials was, 'Help us.'"

Michelle Derito, who owns a hair salon on Kennedy Boulevard, said she had not heard anything about the new lanes until after the lines were repainted.

"I came to work that day, and it was done," Derito said. "So fast, just done."

Kennelly said the county followed the standard procedure to add new lanes. A legal notice notifying residents of the freeholders' June 7 meeting about the loss of parking spaces appeared in the May 31 issue of The Jersey Journal, he noted.

"Nothing about this was secret," Kennelly said. "We have enormous respect for the public hearing process and filed to the letter of the law."

Thomas Mullahey, president of the Hague Street Block Association, however, said more should have been done to notify residents and businesses, adding that he has received letters in the past when neighbors were planning on cutting down trees.

"They make the average citizen do all these mailings, but for something as important as this (the county doesn't have to notify people)?" he asked.

Kennelly said the county will consider distributing fliers or letters in the future to ensure people are aware of any such changes.

Jersey City Councilman William Gaughan, who represents the Heights area, said in a statement he hopes the block associations will join him to solve the problems of off-street parking.