Warwick Recreation and Infrastructure in Motion
New pump track and skate park are finished. Art-guided traffic is ahead.
As traffic choreography in the Village of Warwick is on the cusp of change, one area newly inviting festive frolicking is the new pumptrack, recently open, and the adjacent skate park, which will open with a ribbon cutting on Oct. 18. However, Mayor Michael Newhard and others have observed eager activity on both attractions.
“About a dozen young men have been working on skateboard completion since May, hand forming and finishing it. But we’re keeping kids out now because of liability. We need to get the signage up and landscaping done,” Newhard said.
The pump track was the work of Warwick Lions Club volunteers, he said, with the ribbon cutting on Oct. 2. “It’s the perfect marriage of courses for beginner and experienced riders.”
Meanwhile, a federal grant has funded traffic studies in each Warwick village. Civil engineer Creighton Manning was just hired to do a six-month town-wide traffic safety study.
“He’ll show us where more attention is needed, for instance at intersections and where speeding is common,” Newhard said. “We also sent out an rfp recently to artists for demonstration projects with paint and signage, using art to slow traffic down. Many communities have reached out to artists to use sidewalks and signage.”
One result has been use of “bump-outs” using paint and planters to change traffic patterns by shortening crosswalks, using parking spaces at the edge of crosswalks lessening injury by pinching the road so people can see oncoming traffic.
Meanwhile, the Village is reapplying for the $4.5 million New York Forward downtown revitalization grant, although plenty of revitalization is in motion, with redoing of roads and water infrastructure on Route 94, Colonial Ave. and Main St. Sidewalks are being redone on Oakland Ave. and Galloway Rd. on one side, with both sides to be completed by winter, a New York State Department of Transportation project, Newhard said.
The project, preparing for reclamation and repaving, extends into the Towns of Goshen and Chester, down Route 94 onto Main Street in the Village of Florida, with water infrastructure improvements there and on Route 17A, by Larry’s Deli, redoing a culvert.
In the Village of Warwick, preparation is for reconfiguration of traffic. At the intersection of Route 1 and 94, a traffic light will be replaced by a traffic circle. Spring will bring change on Colonial Ave., as the historic Stanford water trough monument in the middle of the road will be moved to the side of the road by the Buckbee Center, once materials are available to relocate the pump under the monument, Newhard said. The regrouping will make space for multiple walkways, he said, though conceding that temporarily “road havoc” will likely occur.
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