Health & Fitness
The More Things Change...
Buildings come down, trees are torn up, land is leveled and more buildings go up. This is New Jersey.
Despite our efforts to preserve Greystone, there are still those who would prefer to see the property sold for private development. Recognizing this, we have introduced legislation which will give our agreement the force of law, thus protecting this property forever.
The above was in a letter I recently found, written on April 6, 1999, from my then-legislative delegation of Sen. Robert J. Martin, Assemblywoman Carol J. Murphy and Assemblyman Alex DeCroce.
Not much has changed when it comes to the former state mental hospital.
Even after most of the land no longer needed for the refurbished state Greystone hospital was sold to Morris County for $1 and the hulking and decaying stone wards were torn down, the threat of development has never been far away.
That's why State Senators Anthony Bucco and Joe Pennacchio, at the end of 2013, introduced legislation to, yes, save Greystone from private development.
As of March 31, Patch reported the buildings on the state-owned part of the property, including the former administration building, Kirkbride, will finally be coming down despite the best efforts of groups such as Preserve Greystone to keep it standing in some fashion, including apartments or offices or a museum. It simply costs too much to keep the building - which could've been fixed up decades before - standing and there is too much opposition to letting a "developer" turn it into condos.
I'll believe that demoliton when I see it.
The part of the property that was sold to Morris County has been made into a real park, with ballfields, some trails and, most important, open space in one of the most congested parts of the most congested state in America. I won't miss Kirkbride when it comes down but it deserved a better fate.
It is a difficult task balancing the desire for the dollar with the need to leave the land alone, providing clean air, clean water and breathing space. Look at the continuing battles within the NJ Highlands Council between those who want to leave land open to protect the water supply and those who want to sell out while they can, get "just compensation" for their lands, to those who want to put up yet more housing.
When Morris County announced a budget with no tax increase, it did so by yet again lowering the open space tax, which allowed the county to buy farms and other properties to keep them from being built upon. Now there will less money in the till when land values are rising.
Hillsides and barrier islands have been built upon - Hurricane Sandy and the mudslide in Washington state show what happens when you build on land that was never meant to have buildings on it.
My husband and I recently drove through Hunterdon County, which has now become one of the richest counties in New Jersey. If you avoid the big highways, as we try to do, you find the old rural county with some quaint towns and farms with real animals on them.
Then you travel a few miles and you suddenly find a housing development has sprung up like toxic mushrooms. "Luxury apartment residences," I saw on the sign for one of them. Townhomes built on land that had been denuded of trees that could provide shade in summer and hold the ground with their roots during heavy rains. McMansions that all look alike. On one property, we even saw a castle!
This is New Jersey - "luxury" estates, old towns trying to survive and, hidden in the corners and the shadows, the areas where the "help" live - the gardeners, the maids, the servers at the local burger joint, the dish washers at the restaurant, the people who want to break into your homes.
Not all of our boats are rising with the tide of alleged economic prosperity. We are "just getting by." As long as the lawn is mowed and you own the right car - new or "preowned" - everything is fine.
I hope when all the old Greystone buildings are finally down the former farm fields can truly be enjoyed by all and the final threat of development - at least in this one place - is finally gone.
Open space in New Jersey is an endangered species.
Not much has changed when it comes to the former state mental hospital.
Even after most of the land no longer needed for the refurbished state Greystone hospital was sold to Morris County for $1 and the hulking and decaying stone wards were torn down, the threat of development has never been far away.
That's why State Senators Anthony Bucco and Joe Pennacchio, at the end of 2013, introduced legislation to, yes, save Greystone from private development.
As of March 31, Patch reported the buildings on the state-owned part of the property, including the former administration building, Kirkbride, will finally be coming down despite the best efforts of groups such as Preserve Greystone to keep it standing in some fashion, including apartments or offices or a museum. It simply costs too much to keep the building - which could've been fixed up decades before - standing and there is too much opposition to letting a "developer" turn it into condos.
I'll believe that demoliton when I see it.
The part of the property that was sold to Morris County has been made into a real park, with ballfields, some trails and, most important, open space in one of the most congested parts of the most congested state in America. I won't miss Kirkbride when it comes down but it deserved a better fate.
It is a difficult task balancing the desire for the dollar with the need to leave the land alone, providing clean air, clean water and breathing space. Look at the continuing battles within the NJ Highlands Council between those who want to leave land open to protect the water supply and those who want to sell out while they can, get "just compensation" for their lands, to those who want to put up yet more housing.
When Morris County announced a budget with no tax increase, it did so by yet again lowering the open space tax, which allowed the county to buy farms and other properties to keep them from being built upon. Now there will less money in the till when land values are rising.
Hillsides and barrier islands have been built upon - Hurricane Sandy and the mudslide in Washington state show what happens when you build on land that was never meant to have buildings on it.
My husband and I recently drove through Hunterdon County, which has now become one of the richest counties in New Jersey. If you avoid the big highways, as we try to do, you find the old rural county with some quaint towns and farms with real animals on them.
Then you travel a few miles and you suddenly find a housing development has sprung up like toxic mushrooms. "Luxury apartment residences," I saw on the sign for one of them. Townhomes built on land that had been denuded of trees that could provide shade in summer and hold the ground with their roots during heavy rains. McMansions that all look alike. On one property, we even saw a castle!
This is New Jersey - "luxury" estates, old towns trying to survive and, hidden in the corners and the shadows, the areas where the "help" live - the gardeners, the maids, the servers at the local burger joint, the dish washers at the restaurant, the people who want to break into your homes.
Not all of our boats are rising with the tide of alleged economic prosperity. We are "just getting by." As long as the lawn is mowed and you own the right car - new or "preowned" - everything is fine.
I hope when all the old Greystone buildings are finally down the former farm fields can truly be enjoyed by all and the final threat of development - at least in this one place - is finally gone.
Open space in New Jersey is an endangered species.
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