The following is an ‘Ask The Mayor’ question submitted to TLS, and the Mayor’s response. Email your questions for the Mayor to AskTheMayor@thelakewoodscoop.com.
Question:
There is a small but heavily utilized park on Canterbury lane between County line road and Fourteenth street. The park was filled with children and their mothers with strollers etc. Everyone really enjoyed the park for it’s nice layout, shade, park benches, and of course the parks “fun equipment”. that would be the swings, slides, climbing toys, basketball hoops etc.
A few months ago the park was suddenly closed for renovations. Unfortunately nothing has been done. The place is closed and simply falling apart. It’s almost as if this park was forgotten and has completely disappeared from the township’s responsibilities. What has happened? how long does it take for the township to start the renovations? Must it sit vacant & neglected for months or a year before they get to it. This has been a VERY heavily used & enjoyed park.
Can you please give us local residents, some idea of how long it will take till they start the renovations, and about how long will it take to complete. Is there anything we can do to make it move along any faster. Please don’t let this park just sit and fall into ruins & then be an eye sore for all of us who live nearby. I am worried that G-d forbid a child will sneak in to the place & get hurt. It’s a shame that the children & families can not enjoy the park that we pay for with our tax dollars.
Please keep us posted on this issue.
Thank you so much in advance,
LK
one of the many local residents that enjoyed the park
Response from Mayor Coles:
Good morning,
We were hoping to have the playground back in operation sooner, but many of the parts needed to make everything safe for the children were back ordered. I spoke to Public Works on Friday & they tell me that everything should be in shortly and they hope to have the park open for all again in a few weeks.
Ray
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Back ordered for 6 months? Sounds strange.
No matter the problem it’s always someone else’s fault
Lakewood has a major shortage of parks. Look at all the surrounding towns parks that are always full of lakewood residents. I would also try to keep them out, why should they spend all the $$ for the use of Lakewood residents? Let lakewood provide for their own citizens.
Agreed! We would really benefit from a sprinkler park!!!! Instead of overcrowding Jackson’s….
We don’t have the parks that other towns have because the builders are too busy putting up high density housing, simple.
Stop the building and start taking care of the residents that are here before you bring in more poeple.
It’s true. It’s a shame that the surrounding towns have much nicer parks and libraries.
Lakewood is a legacy municipality with the most growth in the state. Lakewood has evolved into a borough. The demand for services and housing has been driven by population not the other way around. The challenge of managing such historical growth on a legacy town infrastructure is enormous. More housing means more utilities, new traffic planning and on and on. The township needs the cooperation and coordination of the county and state which is a tedious and onerous process. All these requests need administation and staff including subcontractors. Lakewood is likely the most challengiing in the state for all the accomodations necessary now and we grow at an unprecedented pace. As far as I know, Mayor Coles is the only mayor with an online forum in the state who wants to hear the public’s concerns directly and takes immediate action on the township’s input despite the frustrations he faces. He is a man of action in a difficult position who takes everyone’s interests seriously and used whatever resources at his disposal, however limited, to navigate the county and state bureaucracy to get to our growing needs being taken care of. Thank you, Mayor Coles.
Well said, Ron. Yes a big thank you to Mayor Coles for his dedication to Lakewood and for his willingness to listen.
Why close a park.prior to having all your parts in house?
If the need treated oak? Are they going to wait till the tree grows to full height.
Ron, much of Lakewood growth is not organic and is the result of heavy marketing. Regardless, setting aside land for parks should be a priority. There was a committee tasked for just that purose in the last Master Plan, what became of it, are there any new parks under development?
@Can’t see the forest for the trees. You picked one word out of the overall context of my post, got it wrong and blamed the whole thing on a notorious Lakewood advertising campaign that no one ever heard of. Why don’t you read Mayor Coles forum and find out the answer to your question? Nothing personal here, I’m also a tree.
Hey Ron,
For a guy who comments a lot, you don’t really seem to know much about what is going on around you. nothing personal of course. Parks, infrastructure, etc, should all have been in place before zoning density was increased.