Trees will come down for street reconstruction
BY CHRISTINE VARNO
Staff Writer

OCEAN TOWNSHIP — Alpern Avenue will get a facelift with new paving, sidewalks and curbs.

But the price includes not only the money to pay for the work, it also includes the sacrifice of 29 swamp maple trees that line the 2 1/2-block length of road. The trees are coming down so that the new street and sidewalks won’t come up.

“The roots are significantly into the street and the sidewalk area,” township Business Administrator David Kochel said.

Kochel said when the neighborhood where Alpern Avenue is located was built, swamp maple trees were planted because they are fast-growing. But, he said, the trees also have a shallow root system that has led to uplifted sidewalks and broken curbs.

“The street was originally constructed decades ago and was never reconstructed,” he said. “Age has taken its toll, and the street is now a prime candidate for a total reconstruction.

The township council, at its Aug. 25 meeting, adopted a bond ordinance for $100,000 that will fund the repairs to the 1,500-foot-long street. The roadway will be repaved, and the sidewalks and curbs will be replaced, according to Kochel.

Kochel said most of the trees along the way will be coming down.

“There’s no way to save them while reconstructing the street,” he said when asked about them after the meeting.

One resident from the neighborhood at the meeting wasn’t at all happy about the prospect of losing the trees.

“You [the council] are destroying my neighborhood by cutting down trees to put up curbs,” Wayne Trestor of Alpern Avenue said. “I bought my home 10 years ago because I was attracted to the tree-lined streets. Your actions are destroying a neighborhood.”

“The concept of doing the street [Alpern Avenue] came from your neighborhood,” Kochel replied. “Over 60 percent of residents were in favor of doing the street. There is no realistic way of improving the streets without interfering with the trees.”

Kochel said when the town marked the trees to be cut several residents whose trees weren’t targeted for removal came out and asked that theirs be taken too.

“They are older trees that really aren’t good street trees,” he said, noting that 13 were felled in the powerful August windstorm two years ago.

“It shows that while the trees looked healthy, they were hollow inside,” he added. .

Kochel said the township requires the property owner to pay the cost of the sidewalk and curbs on their property.

“The town pays for the engineer, the street reconstruction and handicap ramp curbs,” he said.

The total cost for the project is not known at this time, according to Kochel, who said it will be put out for bid by the end of September.

He said the residents will be able to pay the cost off over a period of five years.

“We hope to have the project complete by the end of this year,” he said.

Kochel noted this is the second street to be reconstructed in the neighborhood. He said there are four more streets on which the council will be seeking to make repairs in the future.

“We plan to go through the entire neighborhood over the course of the next couple of years,” Kochel explained.