Is the Grass Really Greener? Or Are We Just on the Other Side?

I will admit, I am not the most informed Hillsborough resident, nor am I the most politically involved.

I don’t have the time to go searching through historical town records and maybe I don’t always get all my facts straight.   However, I do know how I feel and what I see, and I my intentions are good.

When I first moved to Hillsborough in December of 2001, one of the first things that attracted me to this area was the wide open space.  There were farms that I could walk to, literally – and I live in your average suburban housing development.  I even wrote a magazine article on how this part of New Jersey defies what most non-Jerseyites picture New Jersey as.

When most people fly into Newark airport and get their first glance of New Jersey from above, they think that gray buildings, highways, and smoke stacks is all the state has to offer.  But you see, Hillsborough was a hidden gem.  Drive a little south and a little west and you hit green grass, trees, and farms.  At least that’s how it used to be.

I remember the second spring we lived here I took my goddaughter pumpkin picking less than a mile away from my house.  The very next year, the farm closed up shop, and they haven’t plowed their fields in the years since.

My neighbors and I see “McMansions”, as we call them, spring up especially over the past five years, replacing green pastures where cows used to roam.  Now, sadly, many of those larger-than-life houses sit atop former corn fields, empty.  When the housing market collapsed, well, no one except for a very few lucky ones immune to the job market were able to afford to purchase these newly built $600,000 homes.

Was it really necessary to give the cows their walking papers? I don’t know – if farming is that unprofitable, we’re really in danger of losing a lot of Americana, not to mention fresh local produce, milk, and livestock.

Sometimes we Hillsborough residents got excited at some of the commercial improvements we saw come to be a few years ago.  I remember when there was no Lowes on Route 206, and Shop-Rite and Stop ‘N Shop were the only local grocery store chains. Sadly, they are the only local grocery store chains now, too, after Pathmark closed its doors earlier this year.

I’ve seen Cost Cutters go out of business, Charlie Brown’s closed its doors, and Famous Dave’s is no more, either.  Oh, and Hillsborough Pharmacy will soon be a memory, too.  While these commercial disappearances are not the result of plowed-over farmland, it’s a sign, I feel. Does Hillsborough really need to vanquish more farms to build new businesses or homes?  In almost every strip mall there’s space for rent.  There seems to be a surplus of homes to buy.

My daughter and I have been going pumpkin picking and hay-riding at Norz Hill Farm since the first year she was born. What a great place where you can visit the farm animals, sit on straw, pick your own pumpkins, and meet the lovely people who farm the land.  When we went on a hayride two years ago, one of the hayride operators said that they even farmed some of the land owned by Duke Estates.  But, due to hard times,  we found out that they had to sell off most of their cows last year because they couldn’t afford to keep them. 

I’ll just come right out and say it—I don’t want to lose my local farms!  I don’t want overbuilding!  I want my wide-open space!

Now some of you may say, “Lady, if you want wide-open space, move to Nebraska!”  That’s sad, I think.  Why does the eastern seaboard have to be chock full of commerce, buildings, highways, and the largest wide-open space is someone’s backyard?  Developers and towns want to make money – I get that.

But does money have to supersede the beauty of an untouched town?  Do the moneymakers really make money when no one buys the newly built houses, office spaces, or  tenants can’t afford to rent existing available space?  Funny thing is you never see empty strip malls being torn down and farms replacing them instead.

Somehow, someway, I hope we can stop the bleeding and keep the grass.  How do we keep the farmers farming and allow them to keep their land?  How do we prevent commercial re-zoning?  

It’s hard for me not to get emotional about where I live.  I like remembering the good ol’ days of a decade past.  I am excited that my daughter will have the memories of going to real farms during her childhood to pick strawberries, pumpkins, pet cows, and go on hay rides, too.  And she didn’t have to drive 50 miles to do it, either.

But will her children be able to have those same memories, in New Jersey?  In Hillsborough?  I have my doubts.  What did the pioneers do – “Go West young man!”   Well, what happens when we run out of “the West”?