Plans for Rt. 1 day care on hold
Applicant will be heard by Planning Board again in April
BY CHRIS MURINO Staff Writer

SOUTH BRUNSWICK - An application to build a day care facility and office building on Route 1 has received much opposition from the township's Planning Board.

At meetings on Feb. 6 and March 5, Gautam Partners presented their plan for a two-story, 19,000-square-foot building that would hold The Learning Experience (TLE) day-care facility and some office space. About 12,000 square feet of the building, on both the first and second floors, would be for TLE and 7,000 square feet on the second floor would be for general office use.

According to the licensed architect, Matthew Jarmel, the building is traditional red brick and would fit into the surrounding areas.

The day-care center would have two separate, age-appropriate play areas, a make-believe village," and two multi-purpose rooms on the second floor. When the children go to these second-floor rooms, they would be escorted by a teacher or staff member.

Planning Board member Charlotte Camarota was concerned about office workers getting into the day-care center, due to parents holding the door open and because of the building's shared use.

Michael Weissman, the owner of TLE, tried to ease her concerns by saying that there are usually two people at the reception area to protect any office worker from getting to the day care. There is also a camera on the inside and outside of the building.

"We opened our first day care center in Boca Raton in 1980," Weissman said. "I have vast experience in the operation of a business. In 28 years, I've had one lawsuit."

Weissman said there are about 210 to 212 children at the center at any one time, with about 20 to 22 staff members.

Planning Board member Barry Nathanson said the second floor was his biggest problem with the site.

"I'm having a tough time with how this site works because there's that office use," Nathanson said. "You don't know what tenants are on the second floor."

Parking was also a big issue with the board. There are 49 parking spaces on the site, enough to meet the requirement of 32 for office use. But, since day-care centers have no requirements for parking, the board questioned if there were enough spaces to satisfy both uses.

"There are only 17 parking spaces for the use of the day-care center," Mayor Frank Gambatese said. "That's a little deficient."

Traffic engineer Gary Dean talked about the board's concerns with the parking.

"The parking spaces turn over quite regularly up until 9 a.m.," Dean said. "There's very little office action at that time. The lot begins to fill up and it's not at full capacity until 9:30 or 10 a.m. By that time, all the parents are finished dropping their kids off."

Dean said that it will be most crowded around 9 a.m. when office workers are coming in and the last of the children arrive.

"It's really evenly spread out," Dean said. "Parents come between 3:30 p.m. and 6 or 6:30 p.m. I believe it will be a very successful operation."

Hours of operation would be from 6:30 a.m. until 6:30 p.m. and parents usually arrive over the course of a three-hour span, 6:30 - 9:30 a.m.

The board also raised concerns about the size of the parking lot possibly being dangerous for children.

"Parents are required to park their car and check their child into the center," Jarmel said. "It's about a five to six minute process to do this."

"I don't see any difference between a child care center or ShopRite," Weissman said. "Parents are responsible for their children.We want a safe environment, but parents have to take care of their children."

The board was also concerned about a variance for a 300-foot setback.

"I see the problem here is the frontage," said Planning Board member Paul Prodromo. "If this was a wide enough lot, a lot of my complaints would go away.

Prodromo also asked where the children would go in the case of a fire drill. Navim Gautam, developer of the property, said that the plan would be to put them on a wide-open area of the wetlands.

"You can't build there, it doesn't mean people can't be there," Gautam said.

Three-quarters of the site has been rendered unusable due to wetlands, according to Charles Witczak, an engineer and planner.

At the end of the March 5 meeting, a few of the members expressed their overall concerns about the application.

"My concerns are sharing an entrance with the day-care center and with the office and the turning of emergency vehicles," Planning Board member Debbie Roedel said.

"It's a tight fit," Gambatese said, speaking about having both uses on one property. "[It should be] one or the other."

Gambatese also asked the applicant to consider the future widening of Route 1.

There was no vote asked for by the applicant. They may make changes to their application and will be heard again on April 30.