Counting The Cars

Jon Corzine, the governor of New Jersey, announced that the New Jersey Turnpike will be widened from six lines to twelve between Exit 6, where it meets the connection to the Pennsylvania Turnpike, and Exit 9 in New Brunswick. The divided lanes for cars only and cars, trucks and bases that carry traffic from Exit 8A northward will be extended down to Exit 6. It should be completed in five years.

The standard Jersey joke - "You're from New Jersey? What exit?" is about to get new life.

At a time when gasoline is expected to get more expensive because of the projection of diminishing oil supplies, and at a time of concern for global warming, the New Jersey Turnpike Authority and the state of New Jersey have decided that, to quote those old Pontiac Grand Prix commercials, wider is better. More lanes mean more environmental desecration of the landscape, more room for traffic, and so, more traffic. Despite the evidence that adding lanes and building new highways only invite more traffic and more congestion - the parkways of Long Island are a classic example - New Jersey seems bent on an autocentric solution to the the bottlenecking on this stretch of the highway.

Granted, a little widening - a little, mind you - may be necessary. This expansion likely anticipates the new interchange between Interstate 95 and the Pennsylvania Turnpike across the river. Interstate 95 crosses but does not connect to the Pennsylvania Turnpike in Bucks County. I-95 goes on to suburban Trenton, where it was supposed to turn to the northeast and merge with the New Jersey Turnpike near Metuchen at Exit 10, but that stretch of highway was never built. Once the new I-95/Pennsylvania Turnpike interchange is completed, the section of the Pennsylvania Turnpike between this interchange and the New Jersey Turnpike will be redesignated I-95, and I-95 will thus merge with the New Jersey Turnpike at Exit 6.

So, the New Jersey Turnpike Authority is expecting a lot of traffic as a result.

I won't contribute to it. I am always scared to go on the New Jersey Turnpike. Its long, straight lanes scare me, as does the preponderance of large trucks and buses on it. Even the road itself - with broken white lines longer than the same lines on regular expressways - looks menacing. The only good thing I can say about the Turnpike is that it's smooth and pothole-free. But I get white knuckles driving on it. When I travel by car to southeastern Pennsylvania, I always avoid the New Jersey Turnpike by taking the old federal and state highways.

While I understand the need to make Interstate 95 a contiguous route from Maine to Florida - something the new Pennsylvania Turnpike interchange will do less expensively than the originally planned freeway in central New Jersey would have done - that should be it. We have built enough highways in America, and we have to move more people by train. You can move more people by train at greater distances with the money spent on a single interchange.

Now imagine how many people could travel by mass transit, and how far, at the same cost as widening the New Jersey Turnpike.