The TNJ Plan
The Together North Jersey (TNJ) was originally published in 2015. A team worked throughout 2020 and 2021 to update the plan given new laws, changing circumstances, and the COVID-19 pandemic, revising important focus areas and recommended actions. The updated plan, divided into 15 focus areas, was published in 2022 and can be found below.
What You’ll Find Inside:
Together North Jersey (TNJ) was created in 2011 to help develop a regional plan for North Jersey. Funded by a nearly $10 million of federal grant and leveraged funds from members, TNJ brought together a coalition of nearly 100 diverse partners—counties, municipalities, educational institutions, nonprofits, businesses and other groups—to develop the first comprehensive plan for sustainable development for the 13 northern New Jersey counties: Bergen, Essex, Hudson, Hunterdon, Middlesex, Morris, Monmouth, Ocean, Passaic, Somerset, Sussex, Union and Warren.
From 2012 through early 2015, TNJ undertook three phases of public outreach (discovery, visioning and action planning) around North Jersey to speak with thousands of residents and stakeholders about what was important to them via public workshops, pop-up kiosks, and online engagement. In the Discovery Phase, TNJ staff conducted a series of public workshops for residents that asked “Where are we now?” and “Where are we headed?” The Visioning Phase asked “Where do we want to be?” The Action Planning Phase which built on the first two phases of outreach, asked, “How do we get there?”
The Together North Jersey Plan (The Plan) is detailed, field-tested guidance for the kinds of public policy North Jersey needs to improve lives and opportunities for residents and businesses. The Plan contains recommendations and strategies for improving individual areas, while also emphasizing the “big picture,” articulating a holistic approach to planning for our region’s future. The decisions made as individuals, as families and as communities are all connected and the first step in planning for a sustainable future is recognizing and appreciating these connections.
Throughout the planning process, Together North Jersey spoke to thousands of residents, local officials, business leaders and others. We discussed the issues and challenges we face in individual communities and as a region. We identified shared values and common interests. We explored what is most important for the future and prioritized goals that can be pursued together. From these conversations, Together North Jersey developed a vision for a sustainable future—a competitive, efficient, livable and resilient future for North Jersey.
- A competitive North Jersey is a place where residents have the education, training, skills and transportation needed to find (and get to) well-paying jobs. Itis home to a variety of growing industries, especially high-tech and cutting-edge fields, that offer a range of opportunities accessible to all residents. It supports innovation, collaboration, partnership and entrepreneurship in a flourishing 21st century.
- An efficient North Jersey makes the most of past investments. Residents and businesses use energy, water and natural resources wisely. A convenient, safe, reliable and energy-efficient transportation system connects people with the places they need to go. Growth happens in places that already have infrastructure, conserving open space and reducing the costs of public services.
- A livable North Jersey is a place where people of different lifestyles and life stages can find and afford a community that fits their needs. Itis a place with available housing options, providing access to arts, culture, recreation and high-quality schools. Livable communities are healthy, safe, inclusive and vibrant places to live, work, play and raise a family.
- A resilient North Jersey is ready for adverse events—extreme weather, climate change, or other major set-backs—and can quickly bounce back from them. It protects wetlands and other crucial ecosystems, and has strong, well-maintained infrastructure (transportation, utilities, water, sewer, etc.). A resilient North Jersey takes steps to be prepared and reduce negative impacts on our communities.
This section includes 15 focus areas describing the strategies that communities, the private sector, governments and state and regional agencies can implement to achieve the region’s vision for a competitive, efficient, livable and resilient future. Summaries of each focus area are provided in the Plan, along with a full listing of all associated strategies. Each recommended strategy is complemented by detailed action plans that outline the specific implementation steps required for each strategy, the entities responsible for taking those steps and the recommended timeframe for implementation.
Focus Areas
Our region’s location, highly educated workforce, and high quality of life has brought great prosperity to the region in the past, and yet continued economic health requires new approaches to supporting entrepreneurs, businesses, and those that invest in the economy of northern New Jersey. From 1980 to 2000, our region emerged as one of the premier office markets in the United States. Economic development was driven by strong market demand for new office space that could meet the needs of a growing service economy. The region also has a highly educated workforce and has been a center of innovation in life sciences, advanced manufacturing and technology. Northern New Jersey has benefitted from its proximity to New York City and Philadelphia, with their large populations, good movement activity, and their being centers of finance and culture.
Economic realities have shifted. Location is less important than it used to be. As more companies implement fully remote or hybrid telecommuting policies, demand for office space is down and proximity to major cities is less critical. Investment in the support systems that allow talented and ambitious entrepreneurs, businesses, and workers to succeed, has increased. This is especially true for women and minority owned businesses that face unique challenges yet are still the fastest-growing business segment nationally. As more localized support is increasing, support systems in major inner city business centers are decreasing along with a decrease in daytime population. In addition, many municipalities lack a straightforward permitting and licensing process that ensures a clear and straightforward route for businesses to thrive. This Focus Area recognizes the important role that permitting and licensing have in protecting public and worker health and well-being, while seeking to make these processes more transparent, accessible to businesses, and easier to administer.
Our region must embrace the goal of expanding innovation and entrepreneurship by actively supporting the growth of emerging companies in a wide range of industries, particularly those that reduce greenhouse gases, use renewable resources, and conscientiously promote the economic well-being of low-income residents, people with disabilities and people of color. Regional collaboration is key to meeting this goal. To accomplish this goal, businesses, regulators, workers and the public need clear information about required licenses and permitting, available financing and technical assistance services, and an environment that fosters communications that explore current and future issues and needs in a holistic environment.
For decades, our region’s highly educated and skilled workforce has been a tremendous asset. However, to thrive economically, our region must continue to support and develop a robust labor market that embraces continued development of our worker’s skills and provides the support systems in place to thrive in the workplace, including access to high-quality internet. In addition, we must ensure there is training and opportunity available to develop skills necessary to get and keep high-quality jobs and to ensure that families have the support that they need to balance the demands of caregiving with workforce demands.
Easy and affordable access to career exploration and apprenticeships that are simple to navigate remains a priority for North Jersey. According to the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, career pathways are designed to help individuals navigate these programs by providing “post-secondary education and training that is organized in a series of manageable steps leading to successively higher credentials and employment opportunities in growing occupations.”
In recent years, New Jersey has expanded available apprenticeships and other career development opportunities. However, it is not always clear how to access these resources and educational, training, and workforce supports are often complex and challenging for students, job seekers, and employers to navigate. A coordinated approach for existing workforce development programs will help create a greater variety of progressive pathways to better, livable wages and support workers in the region and the regional economy as a whole. Exploration of new and innovative opportunities is also important for the region’s long-term economic well-being.
The COVID-19 health pandemic has reinforced the critical importance of worker protections, as essential workers carry out key functions of our economy that require face-to-face interactions such as growing and preparing food, providing transportation services and caring for our loved ones. Supporting public policies that strengthen worker protections and raise awareness within and beyond the public sector will safeguard and strengthen our workforce.
Region-wide or state-wide multi-disciplinary partnerships will be critical to launching an effective marketing campaign for career pathways and supporting workers through resource and information distribution. These partnerships can create a “one stop” location for those seeking career development to learn about opportunities across economic sectors. Another important step towards strengthening workforce development is to conduct research that uncovers and identifies common barriers to career advancement from workers directly, particularly those traditionally disadvantaged in the labor market. Access to existing workforce programs may be impacted by a variety of externalities, including lack of transportation, funding, childcare support, and more. Uncovering these needs will create a more work-oriented workforce and training opportunities.
World-class infrastructure and other amenities have made North Jersey a global hub for people and goods. Long-term investments in freight distribution, transportation infrastructure, and agricultural practices provide an essential foundation for targeted economic development activities that can strengthen and grow our region’s economy. In addition, proximity to New York City and superior transportation connections to extensive consumer and business markets in the northeast, mid-Atlantic, mid-west states and the world give our region a strategic locational advantage. Our region must build on our unique assets and infrastructure and embrace new consumer needs such as e-commerce to strengthen the regional economy while transitioning to a greener economy. Public and private partnerships in economic development are critical for an effective and sustainable use of existing resources and emerging technologies.
New Jersey’s agriculture is another lever to support our region’s focus on building great places. New Jersey is at the forefront of cutting-edge indoor farming practices and has been proactive in preserving farmland. This two-pronged approach to agriculture will ensure our competitiveness. Lastly, new farmers, especially women and minority farmers, should receive further attention and support, with access to learning about best practices. These activities expand access to fresh and affordable foods. This will promote economic development and tourism, which can grow businesses and create jobs. These assets also contribute to the attractiveness of our communities, making them desirable places to live, work and visit.
Asset-based economic development is an approach that recognizes the important role existing infrastructure and unique local resources can play in strengthening the regional economy. It is an approach that seeks to leverage local arts, cultural, natural, historic and recreational assets into sustained economic growth that can benefit the entire region. Toward this end, we need to use our region’s public transit network, agriculture, and global consumer market as a framework for future investment. We should also continue the progress made over the past decade by the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey to ensure our region’s seaport maintains its strategic advantage while bringing needed tax revenue and jobs to the port’s host cities. Finally, we should focus on building and expanding agriculture as a viable economic and workforce activity for new farmers, especially women and minority farmers, strengthen tourism in our region and leverage New Jersey’s heritage as the “Garden State” to support and expand agricultural businesses, urban farming and agritourism.
Embracing policies and actions that direct new development in places with existing capacity can maximize economic and social benefits and reduce new infrastructure’s public and private sector costs. For example, Transit-Oriented Development (TOD) policies can foster mixed-use walkable development patterns near transit services. Strategic reuse of underutilized, vacant or abandoned lands can support community growth and redevelopment goals. Limiting encroachment on unprotected, undeveloped open space and agricultural land can minimize negative impacts on the environment. When designed effectively, these strategies can create engaging, vibrant areas that help to reduce congestion on our roads, protect critical natural resources and habitats and foster more significant community interaction.
From North Jersey’s bustling downtown business districts to community main streets, from densely populated neighborhoods to quiet residential streets and from major transportation hubs to local train stations and bus stops, opportunities for efficient development and redevelopment abound. Embracing flexible land use policies, including infill development (new housing or commercial space on vacant land between existing uses), rehabilitation and repurposing of brownfields (vacant commercial lands with potential pollution challenges), transit-oriented developments (compact, mixed-use development and redevelopment designs that concentrate population and employment in locations easily accessible to transit stations and stops) and “Smart” land use practices that maximize spaces for people and walkable connections over parking requirements can improve the character of existing neighborhoods and help achieve more resilient, equitable and sustainable community design and economic growth vs. separated use zoning practices.
North Jersey’s transportation system includes a diverse and extensive network of facilities and services. While our transportation system serves many of us well, others in the region have difficulty getting where they need to go. Travel options are limited in some places and overcrowded and inconvenient in others. Congestion causes delays on the region’s roadways, with walking and biking being impossible or unsafe in many areas. Northern New Jersey needs a safe, convenient and reliable transportation system that is well-maintained and in which all the parts connect seamlessly. A safer system would save lives and reduce the suffering and costs associated with crashes and accidents. Improving transit stations and stops and connecting services will increase residents’ access to well-paying jobs, good schools, shopping, needed services, recreation and arts and cultural resources. Greater support for shared-ride modes, including public transit and shuttles for people, expands access to opportunity for individuals without a private vehicle and helps reduce energy use and harmful pollutants. Furthermore, creating more options for walking and bicycling will contribute to better public health and healthier communities.
Connecting people, places, and goods with safe, convenient and reliable transportation will take coordinated action by a range of agencies, stakeholders and communities. It will require fiscally prudent transportation projects and investments and close coordination with local economic activity, development projects and land use. Given the combination of budget constraints and strong demand from residents and businesses for improved transportation, diverse stakeholders across the region will need to work together to make the most of existing transportation infrastructure and expand the transportation system’s capacity in economically feasible ways environmentally sound. The following strategies are recommended to improve transportation operations, strengthen linkages among modes, create a more convenient, safe, and seamless travel experience, and maintain the system over time.
North Jersey boasts one of the most diverse populations in the country. The region must continue to create and sustain places and communities accessible to all its residents. Such places are welcoming to people of diverse economic and social backgrounds and afford residents the opportunity to lead healthy, active, and fulfilling lives. For example, children require safe neighborhoods to explore, play, and learn independence. Seniors need housing choices, accessible and reliable public transit, meaningful community engagement, and safe places to walk. All need an aesthetically pleasing and healthy environment. To thrive, North Jersey’s communities must be as dynamic and diverse as their residents; places must grow by providing a mix of residential neighborhoods, work environments, retail and cultural amenities, and public spaces accessible by walking, biking, and public transit.
Elected officials, community-based groups, builders, residents, and other decision-makers at all levels need to think comprehensively about the kind of places – public and private – that they plan for and build. Diverse places help communities grow in ways that address long-standing economic and social challenges and are characterized by the abundance of homes and businesses, inviting public spaces, engaging cultural activities, and bustling commercial centers threaded by a transportation system making these places accessible. Investing in efforts to increase the well-being of the region’s residents will help drive economic competitiveness and prosperity and create more sustainable patterns of development.
Creating economically and socially diverse places requires a clear vision supported by government policy through regulations, design guidelines, prioritizing investment, and building local institutional capacity to implement place-making projects and ensure they meet the community’s goals. While necessary, diverse places are not just about buildings and infrastructure. They require active community engagement, programs and management that permit sustained focus and attention over time. They also require strengthening partnerships between private, institutional and public sector stakeholders to coordinate investment and ensure it yields benefits for all residents.
A home does more than provide shelter; having a quality home that meets one’s physical needs and lifestyle preferences is essential to achieving a high quality of life. But North Jersey’s current housing supply is not meeting the demands of its increasingly diverse population. As a result, essential workers, arriving immigrants, seniors, and young couples starting out often struggle to find suitable housing in the community of their choice.
An inadequate supply of housing and declining public investments in affordable housing have created a longstanding housing affordability crisis. Families spend so much on expensive housing in North Jersey that many have little disposable income left over to spend or save. High housing costs undermine the region’s economic competitiveness, making it hard for companies to attract talent and drive up the cost of doing business.
Since large-scale suburbanization began in the 1950s, housing production in most of the North Jersey region has been concentrated in large-lot, single-family homes. In 9 out of the 13 Together North Jersey counties, single-family homes make up more than half – and as much as 80 percent – of the housing stock. Though construction of multi-family housing ramped up significantly over the past five years, much of the new multi-family stock is in expensive, mid- and high-rise luxury apartment buildings. The supply of other housing types, or the “missing middle,” has been inadequate. Housing types of various sizes and price points, such as duplexes, garden apartments and townhomes, provide a greater range of options to meet diverse income levels, lifestyles and life stages.
The impacts of the housing affordability crisis fall disproportionately on people of color. Disparities in homeownership among white residents and residents of color are a major contributor to our region’s persistent and dramatic racial wealth gap. Exclusionary, single-family zoning and local opposition to multi-family and affordable housing developments produce patterns of economic and racial segregation. Improving access to suitable, affordable housing will help reduce regional disparities by helping low- and moderate-income families achieve financial stability, improve health outcomes, build wealth and access employment, quality education and needed services.
Meeting the housing needs of the region’s diverse populations will require addressing regulatory barriers, educating the public and local leaders, and taking proactive steps to incentivize the production of varied housing types, expand affordable housing and protect the affordability of deed-restricted affordable units. North Jersey must also strategically use and leverage federal and State COVID- 19 response funding to ensure all residents have access to stable housing.
Despite decades of government efforts to subsidize affordable housing and address disparities in housing and other opportunities, North Jersey remains divided. Most lower-income and minority residents live in the region’s cities and older suburbs, with far less access to the higher quality housing, neighborhoods, public services, schools and employment opportunities enjoyed by predominately white, higher-income residents of wealthier suburbs.
According to federal and state law, people have a right to “fair housing,” meaning everyone, regardless of race, color, religion, national origin, sex, family status, disability, ancestry or military status, can secure the housing they want in a neighborhood of their choice. The New Jersey Fair Housing Act states that “municipalities cannot discriminate against low- and moderate-income persons and households.” In its Mount Laurel decisions, the Supreme Court of New Jersey demands that municipal land use regulations affirmatively afford a reasonable opportunity for a variety and choice of housing, including low- and moderate-cost housing, to meet the needs of people desiring to live there. While provision for the actual construction of that housing by municipalities is not required, they are encouraged to expend their own resources to help provide low- and moderate-income housing (NJAC 52:27D-302 h).
In addition, a U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (USHUD) rule requires USHUD funding recipients to affirmatively further fair housing (AFFH) based on the federal Fair Housing Act. This rule defines fair housing to include addressing disparities in access to opportunity and transforming racially or ethnically concentrated areas of poverty into areas of opportunity.
Fair housing is a right guaranteed by law. Government agencies must take affirmative steps to protect against and eliminate discrimination, promote housing choice for all persons, and devote resources to address the needs of disadvantaged and segregated neighborhoods. All of our region’s residents should have a fair chance to find the housing they need in the community of their choice. In addition, all North Jersey communities have a right to public investments and services that allow residents to participate fully in society and reach their full potential.
Our region must improve conditions in the places where lower-income residents currently live and build better connections between these neighborhoods and employment, education, healthcare and other opportunities in other parts of the region. We must increase housing mobility for lower-income residents, making it easier for them to move to and afford to live in places suitable to their circumstances and where better opportunities exist. These goals can be achieved by ensuring fair housing policies and plans are in place and enforced, using public investment programs to create, connect, and strengthen access to local and regional opportunities, and implementing residential mobility strategies.
New Jersey has always been a leader in public education and innovation. Our state consistently scores in the top 10 percent of states on the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP), a nationally administered standardized test that assesses what students know and their ability to perform specific tasks in various subjects. Nearly three-quarters of high school students take at least one Advanced Placement exam. Our students graduate high school and obtain bachelor’s degrees at a higher rate than the national average. At the same time, we have one of the country’s highest rates of educational disparity in academic achievement. Simply put, in New Jersey, low-income students, particularly Black or Hispanic/Latinx, are far less likely to perform well academically than wealthier peers.
One key explanation for this is the concentration of poverty and lack of housing mobility. Families of limited means often can afford to live only in areas served by poorly performing schools. For many students in lower-income areas, graduating from high school is a struggle. They will likely attend schools where most other students are also low-income and face significant challenges, including overcrowding, lack of resources, few extracurricular programs, limited or no Advanced Placement courses, and fewer experienced, highly qualified teachers.
The future of our region’s economy depends on improving outcomes for these low-income students, and we must focus on preparing all of our children for the 21st-century economy. By updating the state’s school funding formula, the School Funding Reform Act (SFRA), to account for the additional costs school districts are incurring since the formula was introduced in 2008, and ensuring full funding to fulfill the SFRA promise of equitable funding, increasing access to high-quality schools, and preparing all of our children for college and careers, New Jersey will be able to maintain our position as an innovative state with a highly skilled labor force.
This Focus Area recommends five strategies to support creating a public education system that prepares all North Jersey students to participate in the economy and civic life. By emphasizing equal access to education opportunity, creativity, innovation, cross-cultural communication, problem solving and other 21st century skills, we can leverage the existing public education system and push forward innovations in education policy that have proven to be successful in other parts of the country. These include rethinking school district boundaries, expanding STEAM (science, technology, engineering, arts, math) programs establishing universal pre-kindergarten and implementing community school programs.
While a community’s plan to build a supermarket or road may not sound like a health policy at first, public decisions like these can profoundly affect residents’ health. Heavy construction could create air pollution that harms people in the surrounding neighborhoods, but a new supermarket could make it more convenient to buy healthy food. A new bike lane could increase the physical fitness of residents and provide alternative transportation options that reduce stress, but it could increase the number of bicycle accidents and potential injuries to cyclists.
Genetics plays an important role in health, but social conditions, such as a family’s ability to afford safe housing or medical care, also affect health outcomes. The physical environment is also important, including air and water quality, proximity to outdoor and recreational opportunities, affordability and accessibility of fresh, healthy foods, and the safety of streets and neighborhoods.
Improving the health of the region’s residents and communities is critically important to ensuring the region’s long-term sustainability. Improving health can reduce health care costs, increase social cohesion, and boost overall well-being and satisfaction—all of which are key elements of sustainability. Building healthy communities requires a “health in all policies” approach by all partners within the region. This means that no matter what their primary mission is—transportation, recreation, arts and culture, housing, natural resource protection, or community development—the policies they develop should consider potential health impacts.
This focus area seeks to improve the health of North Jersey residents by integrating the consideration of health outcomes into all policies and planning. Health in all Policies (HiaP) is a collaborative approach to improving public health and health equity by systematically taking into account the health implications of decisions made by all government and nontraditional partners who have influence over the social determinants of health. Some specific areas for improvement include: increasing access to healthy food and healthcare facilities, enhancing health education programs, creating safe and healthy buildings and neighborhoods, improving neighborhood safety through community-driven crime prevention, and improving conditions in communities that are disproportionately burdened by air pollution and other environmental hazards.
Arts, culture, and history enhance the quality of life for residents in many ways, from fostering community pride and identity to boosting local economies by creating jobs, attracting tourists, and spurring business investment. Equitable development is informed by culture, recognizing shared, interdependent values and practices that shape the quality of our lives. With prosperity relying on embracing inclusion, it ensures opportunity for all and honors diverse communities’ wisdom, voice, and experiences. Whether a bustling business district or a rural hamlet, any community in North Jersey can draw on unique local culture, local talent, and engaged design to create distinct and inclusive places, a process known as Creative Placemaking. Through Cultural Placemaking and planning, artists can aid representatives with developing comprehensive community plans and implementation plans for future cultural programming. Creative placemaking elevates the unique nature of Northern New Jersey through arts, culture, historic preservation, and community-engaged design as a necessary economic and social policy goal.
Artists are experts in critical, creative thinking and finding innovative solutions for entrenched problems. Artists, designers, and cultural planners should shape public investments to aid Creative Placemaking efforts to foster local art districts. Cultural workers provide contextual nuances within existing artistic activities in diverse neighborhoods and have a unique insight to guide investments in Urban Enterprise Zones to support local entrepreneurship. Communities should call upon their local artists and historians to revive public spaces, strengthen community bonds, ideate around and develop solutions to intractable problems, and attract and guide investments. Leveraging these opportunities and others requires policy change built on partnerships and alliances, with a new vision intersecting equity, culture, community, and economic development within our region undergoing historic demographic change.
Integrating arts, culture and history into planning and designing projects results in outcomes that better reflect and celebrate local culture, heritage and values and more effective use of collective resources.
The following strategies can help our region utilize the arts as a tool for community development and revalorization: funding and financing artistic and cultural activities; integrating cultural leaders and artists in all levels of planning and strengthening arts education programs; implementing arts as a solution to community challenges; and improving stewardship and programming of historic places and assets. These strategies will also provide intentionality to advance equity and justice and assure that cultural policies center on racial equity in decision-making, programs, and procedures. Integrating therapeutic and racial equity approaches into placemaking processes will shape ideas about urban design’s role in creating physically and psychologically healthy communities.
The effects of climate change in New Jersey are well documented. Temperatures and sea levels are rising and precipitation increasing. These changes are expected to continue throughout this century, and will have serious consequences for North Jersey communities, infrastructure and natural ecosystems. The impacts of recent extreme weather events like Hurricanes Sandy and Tropical Storm Irene were devastating in our region. While it is difficult to say that individual weather events are caused by climate change, scientists expect extreme weather events to become more frequent and perhaps more severe as the effects of climate change continue in the years and decades to come. Local and state officials must take steps to ensure that the North Jersey region is prepared for, can withstand, and recover quickly from adverse events.
Even as measures to reduce global warming are developed, we must adapt our communities to the inevitably changing climate. New Jersey sustained roughly $30 billion in economic losses from Hurricane Sandy, due in part to inadequate flood protection, land use policies that resulted in development of flood-prone areas, and a lack of understanding about the risks associated with severe storms. Much of this loss was sustained in our region, where extensive damage and repairs disrupted lives, businesses, ports, tourism and the fiscal health of many communities. Resiliency strategies must be incorporated into the land use, hazard mitigation and capital planning process at all levels of government so that future community development and infrastructure investments address the risks associated with extreme weather and a changing climate.
This focus area seeks to improve the resilience of both communities and infrastructure in our region. This can be achieved by: identifying better the region’s vulnerabilities; implementing measures to adapt our communities and infrastructure to a changing environment; expanding floodplain buyout programs; and using green infrastructure to mitigate the effects of extreme weather and climate change.
Almost all commercial activity and modern home life in North Jersey is made possible by our energy infrastructure. Our use of electricity, natural gas, gasoline, and other energy sources has many economic, environmental, and political implications that directly affect the quality of life in the region. Currently, our energy infrastructure is heavily dependent on fossil fuels and is a significant contributor to greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions in the North Jersey region.
Fortunately, there are significant opportunities to improve how we generate and use energy. We can transition to a more sustainable energy infrastructure by using existing technologies, adopting new policies, and taking advantage of market mechanisms that are already known and proven. This will allow our region to benefit from cleaner, more affordable, more secure, and more reliable energy without the emissions that contribute to climate change, harm public health, and degrade the environment.
Implementation of the following strategies can reduce overall energy consumption and replace the use of fossil fuels with more sustainable alternatives by increasing conservation and efficiency; modernizing energy infrastructure, including generation plants, high-voltage transmission lines, substations, and distribution lines and meters that connect individual customers; reducing fossil fuel consumption (via electrification and other measures) in the transportation sector, and pursuing large-scale building electrification.
Ample, clean water is essential to the health of North Jersey’s residents, economy and environment. But the region’s water supply is currently stressed by inefficient water use and pollution. Problems include industrial processes, such as disposal of toxins in manufacturing and cleaning agents by dry-cleaning facilities that contaminate groundwater in localized areas and outdated water systems that combine sewer and stormwater treatment. These combined sewer systems often dump untreated sewage into our waterways during heavy rainstorms. Also of concern are “nonpoint sources” of pollution such as parking lots, farms and subdivisions, which can produce polluted stormwater runoff that contaminates our water supplies.
A variety of approaches can help protect North Jersey’s water systems. Proper management of stormwater runoff in urban areas, such as using “green infrastructure” that captures water where it falls, will improve water quality and help recharge water supplies, as will comprehensive efforts to address the problem associated with combined sewer systems. For example, local governments can act on a 2019 state law that enables the creation of local stormwater utilities that can collect fees from property owners based on how much their property contributes to stormwater runoff. These fees can encourage onsite stormwater retention while also raising funds for much-needed repairs to stormwater systems. Repairs and replacements are often most needed in historically disadvantaged communities with limited financial and technical resources. Improving our region’s water systems must include funding strategies that do not overburden these communities with high costs for safe and reliable water systems.
Protecting water-supply sources, including lakes, rivers and underground aquifers, involves a multi-faceted approach that addresses water use, development patterns and water infrastructure. Protection of water resources ensures a dependable supply of clean, safe drinking water, supports healthy ecosystems, preserves resources needed for business and agriculture, and helps to maintain the quality of life for current and future residents, businesses and agriculture. Improved stormwater management provides important benefits that are crucial to maintaining clean water and a healthy living environment. Without it, nonpoint source pollution, flooding and environmental damage will continue.
We can improve water quality and protect supplies by improving stormwater management, expanding “green infrastructure,” modernizing “grey” infrastructure systems such as drinking water and wastewater treatment plants and pipes, and assisting communities in replacing lead service pipes and eliminating combined sewer overflows.
Ample, clean water is essential to the health of North Jersey’s residents, economy and environment. But the region’s water supply is currently stressed by pollution and inefficient water use. Problems include industrial processes, such as disposal of toxins in manufacturing and cleaning agents by dry-cleaning facilities, that contaminate groundwater in localized areas, as well as outdated water systems that combine sewer and stormwater treatment.
Protection of water resources ensures a dependable supply of clean, safe drinking water, supports healthy ecosystems, preserves resources needed for business and agriculture, and helps to maintain quality of life for current and future residents, businesses and agriculture. We can improve water quality and protect supplies by improving stormwater management, expanding the use of “green infrastructure” and modernizing “grey” infrastructure systems such as drinking water and wastewater treatment plans and pipes, and assisting communities to eliminate combined sewer overflows.
