Penske Trucking

[anon-572n]

[anon-4479]

Agree. I hope there are enough sane people who see the value of Princeton and the negatives of school kids and vote against their candidates Barbara and Eman. Because it is not just this site.

The Halsey Reed site they don’t want developed either and that option is residential. It can house 400 apartments at 20 per acre more If it is an avalon like Princeton. At 1.5 kids per home we are doubling our school size with one build so one TC election could cost us the whole town.

[anon-572n]

[anon-po04]

[Glenn Johnson-p3qs]

Paul Mullen recently posted an article on www.centraljersey.com that was critical of the application by Penske Truck Leasing that was recently approved by the Cranbury Planning Board. Many people reading that article would not realize the part Paul Mullen played in the list of permitted uses in the Highway Commercial Zone and the Penske application specifically. Perhaps I can help by fleshing out the record.

Paul was a member of the subcommittee that was formed to revise some of Cranbury’s land use ordinances. We discussed the permitted uses for the Highway Commercial zone for more than a year. He expressed no reservations concerning the final list of permitted uses that was referred to the Planning Board for comment and then to the Township Committee for action. He also did not express any objection to the language allowing “substantially similar” businesses to those on the list of permitted uses.

On January 18, 2018, Penske Truck Leasing appeared before the Development Review Committee for concept review. The company explained that its business included truck leasing and rental, truck repair for its own fleet, a washing facility for its own trucks, and a fuel island for its own trucks. They presented a sketch indicating the location of the building.

On January 24, 2019, Penske appeared before the Development Review Committee for completeness review. The plan they presented was the same as the sketch they presented during concept review.

Paul attended both Development Review meetings. During one meeting he asked whether the plan conformed to the requirements of Cranbury’s Riparian Ordinance, and the applicant’s engineer confirmed that it did. Paul raised no objections, environmental or otherwise. If he perceived an environments problem, these meetings would have been the perfect times to raise a red flag. Paul is responsible for informing the Environmental Commission of matters discussed at the Development Review Committee. No objection from the Environmental Commission was forwarded to the Planning Board following either of Penske’s appearances before the Development Review Committee.

Penske presented its application to the Planning Board on March 7, 2019. They presented fully engineered plans for the site and testimony concerning the operation of the business and the safety features built into the fuel island. It was subsequent to that meeting that the Planning Board received the memo from the Environmental Commission outlining their objections.

And what were the objections? They were primarily jurisdictional. They believed that the application should have been heard by the Zoning Board rather than the Planning Board. The Environmental Commission lacks the expertise to make that determination. They are intended to be an advisory board on environmental issues of importance to our town.

Why did the Environmental Commission wait until nearly 14 months after Penske came to Paul Mullen’s attention before it raised an objection? I’m sure Paul Mullen or Barbara Rogers could explain that.

In Paul’s article he points out that Village Park and an affordable housing complex (under construction) are across the highway from the Penske site. From the context I assume he feels there will be loud noises coming from Penske. I don’t know whether Paul ever drove to the present Penske site on Route 130 in South Brunswick and stood outside listening for noises, but I have. I didn’t hear any. Certainly nothing about the Penske operation could be heard from across Route 130.

But here is the question every resident of Cranbury should ask. If not Penske, then who? Property on Route 130 will not be used as pasture for unicorns. It will be developed. The former property owner had an offer a few years ago from a group of people who wanted to build a house of worship. To put a house of worship that is exempt from paying property taxes on a prime parcel in a Highway Commercial zone would be a loss to our town. He also had an offer from a developer who wanted to build apartments. Fortunately our zoning doesn’t allow that use in that zone.

[anon-nrq6]

[anon-r302]

Mr. Johnson, if you or your wife are on Facebook I would urge you to join the “You know you’re from Cranbury when...” group and point this out. Mr. Mullen is over there posting this article and I think you should set the record straight. There are a lot more residents getting their information from Facebook than from this message board and I think it’s VERY important for people to be aware of this.

[anon-7563]

Mr Mullen is on the FB group doing quite a Kansas City Shuffle! Blaming the Township committee or whoever’s job it is to know what’s going on, but then when further pressed by a resident it turns out he’s a member of half the committees involved in pushing this thing through. All due respect Mr. Mullen, it sounds like it was YOUR job to know these things! You can shout “J’accuse!” all you want, it sounds like the fact that all of this is only now coming to light is either complete incompetence or deliberate subterfuge on your part! So which is it?

[anon-n0n2]

What I like on FB is Paul going down in flames by his own words. He admitted that he was part of the group that passed the expanded uses, then said he was not responsible because Jeff did not do what he expected.

So:

Paul is not accountable because the zoning officer acted in an unexpected manner against the code.

If the act was unexpected and against the code and he is not accountable then he has to agree that the TC cannot be accountable.

If the TC is not accountable then his campaign push for Barbara At the end is illogical.

Then he was shown how the zoning officer denied a quickcheck and the Zoning board approved it. So his premise that Penske would be stopped if the zoning officer denied the use was shown to be wrong. Which is funny because the EC actively tried to stop the quickcheck and thus Paul knew that the Zoning officer’s denial could be over ridden. So he wrote a blatantly false letter slandering the TC, zoning officer and planning board.

He then was told of the plan to build apartments which Mr. Johnson validated. Paul’s response was that it was false and could not happen as it is not an approved use. Which again brings us back to Quickcheck where the zoning board approved it because legally it is hard to deny a variance.

Why also if he knew as far back as January and did he not alert residents then? Instead he held that information when it could have been acted on and is using it now to say it’s too late and we’re screwed so vote a new TC member.

Last year we had Andrew running a surprise write in with Mike saying he had no idea. Now we have members of the EC either hiding information to use it for political gain or admitting they are incompetent by not paying attention or having any clue as to their responsibilities. Either way this is not good.

[anon-26p3]

Glenn posted his letter on FB.

First Paul defends himself by saying he was unaware the Zoning Officer said it was a permitted use. As a DRC member his is supposed to take action to study and prepare that means finding things out about the application.

The he says he did not raise it to the EC earlier because the application might not go anywhere. Yet he was concerned enough to raise it now?

He mentions he asked about the Riparian zone, but was earlier admitting there was no impact.

He admits he had no clue about zoning language, yet serves on a land use entity for years.

He makes it sound horrible, yet writes this letter informing residents after the PB hearing? If so bad then why not before?

He the ends saying Housing is preferred. He prefers we lose Princeton thantake on Penske. He is absolutely insane and talking from the point of I have no kids why do I care.

His push is for Eman and Barbara to be the Dem candidates and both share the view because he is telling people they are the ones too chose and neither has stepped up to say they disagree with Paul. With a property in question that can house 400 apartments instead of a warehouse and 600 kids still up on Halsey Reed. We can not afford to change the TC to this view. Paul would rather us lose Princeton than add another warehouse.

[anon-572n]

[anon-26p3]

Excellent points. I hope people vote and not just the Indivisible people.

[anon-26n6]

Glenn is a condensending prick.

[anon-26p3]

[topsy-5699]

[anon-0q7n]

Art must have paid Glenn, Dan, and Jay some kickback to get that passed.