New Crosswalks Finished in Downtown Bernardsville

With the final striping finished on Wednesday, work is complete on the replacement of 13 crosswalks in downtown Bernardsville that were installed about four years ago as part of a project to spruce up the area around Olcott Square.

The walkways, lampposts with flowers, curbing and other improvements are still in place. However, the synthetic brick crosswalks, including many along Route 202, had crumbled, said John Macdowall, the borough's public works director.

Work began about two weeks ago to mill out the old material and install asphalt instead, Macdowall said. "We did the striping last night," he said on Thursday.

Macdowall said the same type of crosswalks installed in other towns also had deteriorated. "The product doesn't seem to hold up," he said.

Macdowall said the borough spent about $40,000 to hire Crossroad Construction, a different contracting company than that which initially performed the downtown reconstruction, to remove the old material and install the new crosswalks.