News

Listed below are excerpts from our newsletter for the full stories Please click here to download or print our recent newsletter.

Top Stories

• Volunteers needed to clean up Carteret garbage patch

  

  

  Photos courtesy of Debra Partesi

  Portions of the Rahway River in Carteret found themselves under several feet of plastic bottles following several Spring nor'easters. Volunteers are needed to help clean up this mess. Please contact RRA Trustee Fred Virazzi at 732-541-1914 if you would like to help.

  Please see a news story on our efforts by clicking here.

• Rahway River Association Supports Open Space Funding Referendum

  

  Jason Towlen / MyCentralJersey

  Union County Freeholder Bette Jane Kowalski joins Rahway River Association executive director Dennis Miranda, left, and Keep It Green chairman Tom Gilbert on Tuesday in Rahway Riverfront Park to announce support for a ballot question on if voters should continue funding the New Jersey Green Acres Program.
  Click Here For Full Article

  On November 3,2009 the voters of New Jersey will have a historic opportunity to restore funding for the NJ Green Acres Program. The state program for preserving open space and farmland is a model for the nation. With funding drying up in 2009, private landowners will have a difficult time selling their lands for open space preservation. With the recession reducing property values, a historic opportunity to leave a green legacy for the Garden State hangs in the balance. As a proud member of the statewide 130 group strong Keep It Green Campaign, we recognize that without these funds we may never protect the hundreds of acres of tidal marshlands found at the Rahway River Mouth, the 31 acre Cranford Conservation Center and the 35 acre Kawameeh Marsh from development. With municipal budgets shrinking and counties increasingly under pressure to provide more parkland, we cannot afford not to vote for $200 million for 2010. Earlier this year Governor Corzine and the NJ Legislature voted to put the Green Acres, Water Supply and Floodplain Protection, and Farmland and Historic Preservation Bond Act of 2009 on the ballot. Continue the legacy for yourself and future generations to enjoy!  
  Click Here to Read Press Release

• A Greenway grows in New Jersey
  
  

  The prestigious Edward J. Bloustein School of Planning and Public Policy held a Planning Studio of graduate students in the fall of 2008 with the charge of developing the Rahway River Greenway for the next generation. Presided by Susan Gruel and Fred Heyer of the renowned Heyer and Gruel Planning Firm, the class collected information from a wide range of sources in county, municipal and state agencies and institutions pertaining to parkland, open space funding, natural resource inventories and greenways that was panned and/or implemented in the 41 square mile Rahway River watershed. After collecting the data, the class collaborated and wrote a draft greenway handbook that will offer a vision of developing the Rahway River Greenway throughout the region. The greenway would expand eastward towards the Rahway River mouth to include the cities of Linden and Carteret. From the traditional Union County Park system’s green necklace, which ends at Milton Lake Park, the Rahway River would connect to the emerging City of Rahway River Greenway and the Linden Hawkrise Nature Sanctuary on the north side of the River. On the south side of the Rahway, a greenway would extend from Middlesex County’s Medwick Park to annex lands that are landlocked and economically underutilized such as junkyard, wetlands and vacant lots east and west to the confluence with the Arthur Kill. Consolidating municipal greenways in Essex County would create a shared vision, design standards and accessibility on an urban landscape. With a preliminary draft in hand, the class held a public meeting in mid-December of 2008 for the benefit of the public. With nearly 40 attendees, the class to presented a PowerPoint demonstration of how to achieve the expansion of the greenway. Five case studies were presented of where the greenway is planned to include the daylighting the river in Woodbridge, reversing a redevelopment area that endangers sensitive wetlands in Carteret, and increased parkland in Cranford.

• Rahway River Association
  Celebrates Earth Day with Cleanup!

  Rahway River Association Teams Up With Land Conservancy of New Jersey, Union County Parks and Urban Renewal and Comcast Corporation

  In 1999, Mayor Jim Kennedy and the upstart Rahway River Association led by founder Jim Lynch turned 11 homes in a chronically flooded neighborhood into a 10 acre nature preserve managed by the Union County Parks and Urban Renewal. A decade later, Bezaga Park is remarkable oasis with towering trees, flowering shrubs and colorful perennials. Yellow Warbler, Willow Flycatcher, Wood Thrush and Cedar Waxwing call Bezaga Park home. On Earth Day, an army of Comcast Corporation employees selflessly offered an eight hour day to remove invasive plants, weed the flower beds and place fresh mulch on the park’s trails. At the direction of Rosalie Lavinthal of the Land Conservancy of New Jersey and Betty Ann Kelly of the Union County Parks and Urban Renewal, the Comcast employees devoted their sweat equity to make this urban preserve more pristine, less littered and more appealing for community and the birds too!   Union County Freeholder Alexander Mirabella (pictured above with RRA Executive Director Dennis Miranda, Union County Parks representative Betty Ann Kelly, Conservancy’s Rosalie Lavinthal and an unnamed Comcast Executive) and Rahway Mayor Jim Kennedy made brief appearances to rally the volunteers and express t heir appreciation for the Earth Day cleanup.   The Rahway River Association is deeply grateful to the Comcast Corporation, Union County Board of Chosen Freeholders, Union County Parks and Urban Renewal, the Land Conservancy of New Jersey and Mayor Jim Kennedy for making Bezaga Park the urban oasis that it is today!

• Do Ospreys Nest on the Rahway River

  Throughout the months of July through September, the children of the John F. Kennedy Community Center in Rahway were led by Executive Director Dennis Miranda on nature walks of the seldom-used Rahway Riverfront Park.  Donning binoculars, the boys and girls saw dozens of species of birds, butterflies and other elusive animals like muskrat and woodchuck. But the highlight of every tour was the likelihood of seeing an osprey..... more