Highway Madness: Holiday Travel In New Jersey
My family decided to brave the state's highway system one recent
Thanksgiving by traveling the New Jersey Turnpike south to my
sister's house off of Exit 7A. We started on Exit 18, knowing
full well that we would hit some traffic before we arrived at
her home some 70 miles later. Little did we know that our trip
would be a bit of an adventure: not the type we would have liked
to participated in either.
It was shortly after the noon hour when our car passed through
the EZPass booth. We soon found ourselves traveling past Newark
Liberty Airport and the "bucolic beauty" of industrial Linden,
NJ. Choosing the car-only lanes seemed most sensible; with
enough big rigs and buses on the road we didn't want to subject
our midsize car to the wake of a tandem trailer whooshing on by.
Soon after making that decision we noticed brake lights more
than one mile down the road and a helicopter hovering overhead.
Uh oh, this did not look good.
As we arrived near the stopped traffic, police cars and
emergency vehicles screamed by along the shoulder. Within ten
minutes we were upon the scene: a green minivan had gone off the
road and flipped on its side. We didn't want to stare too
closely but it did look like as if a small tree was sticking out
of the windshield. We all said a prayer for the inhabitants and
were thanking God that the rescue workers were already there
doing what they do best. Moments later the traffic broke and we
found ourselves once again heading south on the turnpike with
not a little bit of thanks to God on our part that we were safe.
Holiday travel in New Jersey is fun. Okay, barely tolerable is
more like it. If you have family more than 25 miles away, more
than likely you will be on one of the major roadways at some
point in your trip. It seemed, at times, that the entire New
Jersey populace was going where we were going. I only hoped that
my sister had a large enough turkey for everyone.
By Exit 8A, traffic had slowed again so we decided to exit the
turnpike and follow Route 130 south. Not a great choice as Route
130 is a four lane roadway desperately needing more lanes and
less traffic lights. Still, we felt that it beat the turnpike
parking lot syndrome.
Near Cranbury we began to experience deja vu all over again as
the saying goes. Stopped traffic. Sirens. Emergency vehicles
spotted in front of us. The entire highway closed and traffic
rerouted. Unlike the previous accident, we weren't going to
witness the rescue attempt. So, we said some more prayers for
the victims, exited Route 130, and found ourselves following
other cars through the town of Cranbury.
At this point, we were in unfamiliar territory, but I didn't
mind it. Cranbury is a lovely historic town that seems set in
the mid-19th century. Nothing is new, everything is preserved.
If you must be detoured somewhere in New Jersey, this town is
the place to visit. Tastefully decked out in Christmas splendor,
Cranbury looks nicer than Walgreen's town of Perfect. It isn't
perfect, but it is real!
Somehow by following signs -- there are places in New Jersey
where signs will get you where you are going -- we arrived at my
sister's home. We shared our stories of accident scenes
witnessed, a detour taken, and a town admired. The highway
madness of earlier that day soon faded away as we enjoyed the
company of family and our Thanksgiving feast.
In the early evening we decided to take our tired children and
head home. Traffic was much lighter and it moved quickly.
Heading north on the New Jersey Turnpike, we decided to exit the
road and travel north on the Garden State Parkway, which would
bring us closer to our home. What had been a two hour trip down
was looking like a 75 minute sprint home. Everything was clear
and seemed uneventful. How soon that would change.
We noticed in the vicinity of the Union tolls that traffic was
slowing down. At first, we chalked it up to the usual bobbing
and weaving one must do in order to find the correct toll lane.
However, as we made the approach to the tolls we looked over to
the southbound lane and saw the all too familiar scenery of
emergency vehicles. Not again.
This time the scene seemed even more horrific. Pulled off the
road just south of the toll booths was a public transit bus. A
police officer stood outside shining a light through the broken
passenger windows. We could see all the windows were blown out
by a fire that appeared to have consumed the bus. None of us
wanted to imagine what happened; we simply grimaced and said yet
another prayer to Almighty God for mercy.
The remainder of the trip home found our car engulfed in
silence. Looking back, I certainly can give thanks for not being
involved in any one of the three accidents. We don't know if any
produced fatalities, but we do know that lives were changed that
day. Whether people were speeding, cut off, falling asleep
behind the wheel, or for whatever other reason the accident
happened, we will never know. Quite frankly, it no longer
mattered.
What we do know is this: even under the best conditions and in
the best weather, road trips cannot be taken for granted. New
Jersey roads are crowded, but serious accidents occur all over
the country. That is why our family prays for traveling mercies
before we take an extended trip and why we are quick to hold
victims up in prayer when we come upon an accident scene. Life
is too precious to do anything less.
This article originally appeared on Townstead.com, a defunct
site managed by Matt Keegan. It was part of his "Life in New
Jersey" series of articles.