By Michael Lovito
After a long two-month wait, Morris Plains residents up in arms over plans for a drive- through McDonald’s on Speedwell Avenue finally got their chance to grill the project’s traffic engineer at Tuesday’s planning board meeting.
Craig Peregoy of Dynamic Engineering was sworn in as a witness for the owners of 415 and 435 Speedwell Ave., the would-be site of the fast-food giant’s next location, and tried to assuage both the board and the public’s concerns about the possibility of drive-through queues backing up onto the state highway and causing delays and danger for drivers and pedestrians alike.
According to Peregoy, a drive-through restaurant like McDonald’s can expect an average of 710 cars to enter its parking lot in a day. But he also said that most of those drivers are part of “pass by traffic,” and would be driving down Speedwell Avenue whether there was a McDonald’s there or not. This, he argued, was proof that the burger joint’s presence wouldn’t significantly affect traffic in the area.
“What you have to keep in mind is that those traffic runs going in and out are not all people who have come far and wide to McDonald’s,” Peregoy said. “Most of them are already traveling on Speedwell Avenue, and now there’s a McDonald’s there, so they can stop in and get a cup of coffee and their Egg McMuffin and continue on their way.”
But despite Peregoy’s assurances that there was only a 0.01 percent chance that enough cars would descend on the drive-through at the same time for the line to spill over onto Speedwell, some members of the public questioned whether his statistical projections could accurately capture the traffic patterns of the road in question, given the presence of the Borough Elementary School and the Joyful Noise Preschool and Daycare Center across the street.
“Your analysis only has the afternoon traffic from 4 to 6 or 7, something like that,” Dan Conway said. “But the two o’clock time, 2:30, that’s when traffic builds. It’s literally going to be stopped, because of school, because of pre-kindergarten. Why wasn’t that analyzed?”
Peregoy replied, to a smattering of laughs from residents used to Speedwell’s afternoon gridlock, that he limited his study to peak breakfast, dinner, and Saturday hours because, regardless of location, that tends to be when McDonald’s is the busiest.
“I’m looking at the roads when it’s worst, and McDonald’s when it’s worst,” Peregoy said. “So, if it works there, it’s going to work at 2:30.”
In addition to the after-school rush, Laurie Cama said she didn’t think Peregoy’s analysis took the traffic generated by the Central Park sports complex into account.
“I wonder if there’s a chance to redo your study at a time when we have those sporting events at Central Park, because the amount of not only school buses from around the region, plus just hundreds of spectators and cars, if McDonald’s is there, I expect that some of them will try to head to the drive-through,” Cama said.
“I think those volumes should be looked at. Perhaps it can be redone to look at those times and additional volumes that happen fairly frequently during the sports season.”
‘I’M WAITING FOR THE MATERIAL QUESTIONS’
While Peregoy’s testimony took up the bulk of the meeting, the evening began with one final round of public questions for civil engineer Tiago Duarte, who also provided testimony in September and October.
For a moment, it seemed as if Tuesday’s meeting was about to reach the same tense tenor as the opening installment two months ago. Joe Amorosa, a Dayton Road resident, pressed Duarte for granular details about the site’s demolition and lighting plan, while also asking him why he referred to Morris Plains, which is a borough, as a “township” in the documents he submitted to the board.
After about 20 minutes, applicant attorney Frank Vitolo became frustrated.
“Were you at the first two meetings?,” Vitolo asked. “I’m waiting for the material questions about the ability of McDonald’s to operate at the site, not technical questions of the plans. There are a lot of people looking to ask questions.”
When the crowd murmured their approval of Amorosa’s approach, Vitolo reluctantly relented.
“Alright, okay, good, let’s do the whole night on this gentleman,” he said. “Fine with me.”
Eventually, after nearly 20 minutes of questions from Amorosa, Vitolo appealed to board Attorney Andrew Brewer to intervene. At Brewer’s behest, Amorosa limited his questions to the two most recent exhibits submitted by Duarte.
Amorosa approached the microphone again at approximately 11:30 pm, this time to ask Peregoy about his traffic analysis. Given the late hour, board Chair Suzanne McCluskey asked if his questions could wait until the next meeting. After turning around and quietly conferring with the long line of concerned citizens behind him, Amorosa closed the meeting with five short words.
“We all want to go home,” he said.
Further testimony regarding the proposed McDonald’s will be held at the Morris Plains Community Center at 7:30 pm next Monday, Nov. 18, 2024.
