Walkable Suburb » Green Living

Victory Gardens In Montclair, Verona, and Glen Ridge

Lina Panza — Sat, 31 Jul 2010 13:30:34 +0000

After closing on their bank-owned Colonial in Verona, one of the first “improvements” Bil and Ashli made was to add a vegetable garden to their backyard. They are predicting a prolific harvest of beans, onions, tomatoes, and Chinese sweet potatoes, of which they only eat the greens.

With 40,000 shade trees in Montclair, some gardeners have found that the backyard is just too shady to grow vegetables. A front yard flower and vegetable patch, however, is always an option, and can even replace the entire front lawn, giving the house a verdant and functional appeal. Robin of Glen Ridge has replaced her front lawn with a beautiful and bountiful combination of flowers and edibles. In her garden of Eden she grows rhubarb, cucumbers, beets, lettuce, squash, and herbs.

Montclair resident and food writer Laura has a front yard garden that is bordered by stones and integrates flowers and vegetables in the European fashion. This design, which runs along the path to her front door, works especially well because it welcomes visitors into her pleasant home and busy kitchen.

As for me, I have also established my raised-bed garden in the front yard, the only place that gets consistent sun.

When You Move to Montclair, Claim Your Cash For Your Old Fridge!

Lina Panza — Sat, 03 Jul 2010 13:49:33 +0000

The NJ Dept. of Environmental Protection has begun a new program in which old refrigerators or freezers that are not energy-efficient can be traded in for a $50 rebate. NJ residents must meet the criteria (listed here), which includes being a customer of a commercial, not municipal, electric utility company (Most Essex County residents use PSE&G). A new, more energy-efficient fridge or freezer can save you more than $100 a year on your electric bill, and is better for the environment. This handy little calculator tells you how much your current fridge or freezer costs to operate now, and how much you could save with one that qualified for Energy Star. Trading in your fridge or freezer is better for you and better for your town, and now comes with a $50 bonus! Why not?

Find Your Community Walkability Rating

Lina Panza — Thu, 17 Dec 2009 21:55:34 +0000

What Is Your Community Walkability Score?

walking in Montclair neighborhood

I’m a big fan of the rating website, www.walkscore.com, but its algorithm relies mostly on the proximity of a house to stores and community resources. But to find walkability rating, it’s not just about distance — it’s also about the quality and ease of the walk. Factors like wide sidewalks, shade trees, good lighting and flat topography matter a great deal in determining a walkability rating. I downloaded this walkability checklist from www.walkinginfo.org and walked through my own Watchung Plaza neighborhood in Montclair.

Here’s what I found, both good and bad.

What makes Montclair a Walkable Community?

Montclair NJ

Lot’s of large trees to keep the sun off your back
Most streets not to wide to cross
Most streets have sidewalks
Streets and sidewalks are free of litter and debris
No loose dogs
Curb cuts in many sidewalks (for strollers and wheelchairs)
Flat heading East toward the train station

Things to Improve…

Many sidewalks uneven and cracked from tree roots
Spotty lighting – some areas well lit, others not so much.
Steep hill heading West toward the “Mont” of Montclair
Tricky intersection at Park St. and Watchung Ave

How walkable is your neighborhood? Download the checklist and let me know.

Think Twice Before Buying a House Next to a Gas Station

Lina Panza — Fri, 11 Sep 2009 15:01:25 +0000

I’m a fan of mixed use. Mixed use is the practice of allowing different types of buildings to coexist in a single neighborhood – for example, residential space next to/on top of restaurants and businesses. By adding vitality and activity to a neighborhood, mixed use benefits a community because residents are able to walk to things that they need, like stores, work, church and transit. But there are certain land uses that are best kept away from the rest of the neighborhood – gas stations among them. In Montclair, two former gas station sites continue to undergo remediation for chemical contamination twenty years after they were first tested. Both of the locations, in Upper Montclair on Valley Road and on Orange Road in the South End are near houses, condominiums and small businesses. Who needs to walk to a gas station anyway?

Living on the grid – not the cul-de-sac

Lina Panza — Thu, 20 Aug 2009 15:52:06 +0000

When I walk to Watchung Plaza from my Montclair home, I take a short route through an interconnected grid of streets and through a small park. I wave to my neighbor on the way. I stop for a brief minute in the park to chat with a friend who’s on her way home from work (she’s just gotten off the 5:31 train from Manhattan). It’s social. It’s interactive. It’s exercise. It’s green.

On the other hand, it’s very difficult to walk to the train station, or the corner store to get milk in a town that is laid out in a branching street pattern with a series of dead-ends -aka cul-de-sacs- feeding in to a main artery. In these configurations, you can be a stone’s throw from your destination, but have to travel a mile to get there. This may be a satisfactory layout for the car but not for the pedestrian or bike rider.

Watch this very clever video from the Congress for New Urbanism and you’ll see what I mean…

www.youtube.com/watch?v=VGJt_YXIoJI

Top 10 Walkable Places in Montclair

Lina Panza — Thu, 06 Aug 2009 19:53:01 +0000

1. The train station (any one of the six)

2. Watchung Plaza for a dozen bagels on Sunday morning

3. The farmer’s market on a Saturday in June for local rhubarb and asparagus

4. Tierney’s Tavern on the way home from work for a retro burger and beer (no phone, no credit cards!)

5. The Wellmont Theater on a Saturday night to see David Byrne, Kathy Griffith or Rosie O’Donnell

6. Tinga Tacqueria on Monday and Tuesday nights when kids eat for $2

7. The “all children” playground in Edgemont Park on a weekday afternoon in spring

8. Anderson Park on the way to work for early morning Tai Chi

9. American Royal Hardware (aka Mr. Charlie’s) for that whatchamadoohickey that you’ll never find at Home Depot

10. Van Vleck House and Garden for a leafy respite