Hike #1287; Phillipsburg Area Loop

Hike #1287; Phillipsburg Area Loop

1/7/20 Phillipsburg Area Loop with Justin Gurbisz and Kirk Rohn

This next hike would be another loop, again focusing on areas around the Phillipsburg Mall, because of its imminent demise later in the month.

In duh mawl

I’ve been getting some conflicting stories about what’s going to be happening with the mall, and this visit only led to a few more of them.
At the time of planning, it was looking like the last day for the mall was going to be the 13th I think, and so I wanted to plan one last farewell for it. We’d hiked through it so many times in the past, and I spent a lot of time growing up around there.
We met in the mall parking lot to start off over near the Taco Bell this time, that way we could walk through the mall and continue with the planned loop I came up with directly from out the other side.
The Phillipsburg Mall opened up in 1989 and had its typical anchor stores with tons of others inside. It was always hugely busy, and had a big food court. After the food court was removed several years ago, it seemed to go down hill pretty fast.
When Sears closed down a few years ago, it had leaks in the ceiling. Only nine months after closing, the store collapsed. Now, the ceiling is leaking badly in the rest of the mall.

Empty

I’m of the opinion that soon after every store and their stuff is out, the mall is going to be fast demolished. They don’t want to fix that leaking roof, that’s for sure.

Empty mall

We wandered on through, and made our way to the Santa Clause area where they had actually a very nice Mall Santa that everyone loves. No one was around, and they had this disturbing “Ho Ho” mirror thing in there.
We went around to the other side, moved the gate, and I sat in Santa’s chair. Justin grabbed one of the wrapped gifts and sat on my lap for absolutely hilarious photo op. He wanted to rip the package open, which probably would have been really funny, but I didn’t want to get kicked out just yet.

Ho Ho?

We headed down to Spin Me Round, the store owned by my friend Stephanie Nagy. She has everything like 50% off, and there was a book I nearly purchased the last two times I was in there on the Reading Terminal Market in Philadelphia. Each time I put it back, I thought I should just grab it. This time, I had no excuse not to. I went there specifically thinking that if it was there, I would get it.
The book was hard to find in the huge collection, but I found it and picked it out. I also found a small thing on Gettysburg that looked pretty good, so I picked that up too.
I then went over to the CDs and skimmed through several of them looking for stuff I might want. It’s too cheap not to grab something. I figured I could use them, even if I already had copies, to play in my car.
I ended up finding two of the Elton John greatest hits volumes, a compilation by The Who, as well as Paul McCartney’s “Chaos and Creation In The Back Yard”, which is one of my favorite albums of the last twenty years. I’d buy a dozen of those.

One stop???

After I had made several selections, I headed over to the desk where I could see Stephanie came out from the back room. She had posted on line that the store was going to be moving, but it had not been specified where exactly on the last post I saw.

Leaking roof means doom

She confirmed that the store is going to the Palmer Park Mall, and that she was supposed to be getting a lot more space. That sounds pretty good, but the only sad part of that is she was not sure if the books would be coming with her for the new store.
It’s too bad, because I’ve always found some great books from her over the years, even going back to when she had her original store in downtown Hackettstown.
She also told me that they had to be out I think by the 20th, which was later than I had thought. I would have to plan yet another farewell P Burg Mall hike.
She also said that after the closing of the mall, there was still a car show and some other thing scheduled to take place, so the building would apparently still be standing for a little bit longer. However, by the next day, I got confirmation on line that the car show had a change of venue, and would also be going to the Palmer Park Mall.
So, I am thinking that by the end of January, the mall will be entirely closed off.

In the mall

We headed out and walked further through the mall. White buckets were sat up to catch water coming through the ceiling.
We exited at the side next to Kohls, which is the only store still remaining of the anchor store buildings. Apparently, that part wil remain open, because they own the building, while the rest is another single owner. Still, I hear even Kohls is looking for a new location somewhere nearby.
We headed out into the parking lot, and it was quite cold. I actually wore a hat on this hike, which is atypical of me regardless of what the weather is.

P Burg Mall

This would be a particularly long day for me. I had already walked seven miles at work doing trail work in Voorhees State Park earlier, and so I would end up having a minimum 22 mile day.
I almost headed back to my car to drop off all of the stuff I’d bought, but didn’t feel like walking extra, so I carried it the entire way.
I wonder how the property is going to be handled, because half of it is in Lopatcong Township, and the other half is in Pohatcong. I’d imagine it has to be pretty complicated for tax purposes and such.
We headed through the parking lot and then out to Foch Blvd to the south. We passed through a development, and then crossed over Rt 519 past Ruby Tuesdays.

Santa M'ke

I’ve seen this area change so much. This parking lot we were walking into used to be the original Walmart location, but they moved down the street when it became a Super Center. Now it’s a Marshalls and several other things.
We continued down through the lot and past the Regal Cinema movie theater, then skirted the back of the property out to the access road called Bliss Blvd. We went behind the new Walmart, and then out to New Brunswick Ave where we turned right.
The wind was pretty bad in these open areas, but we pushed through.
We turned left on the much less used Edge Road, and the sun was setting beautifully to our right.
I was surprised at the amount of traffic we had, even though it wasn’t much at all. My plan was to walk nearby Still Valley Road, which I’d never done a hike on, specifically because it had been closed for bridge work for so long, but it had too much traffic for a closed road.
We got to the end of Edge Road and turned right on Still Valley Road, and still had traffic.
There were still signs up saying that the road was closed, but we had more traffic coming at u there than we had on Edge Road.

Santa M'ke's lap

We descended on the road, and soon came to the former Central Railroad of NJ underpass. The tunnel under the railroad was built and then back filled when the line was first built about 1853. It was then coated with concrete. The original stone work can be seen walking through, but the outside was earlier Rosendale style concrete, which required a different kind of patch work for repair.
When I was on the Warren County Municipal and Charitable Conservancy Trust Commission, we funded the preservation of this structure, because they otherwise wanted to tear it down.
There were gates at either end of it for if they want to close the road (they probably do it for ice).
I figured we might have trouble from passing cars, but it was alright. None passed us until we were through.
We descended a bit further, and crossed over the Pohatcong Creek on the old four panel Pratt Pony Truss bridge. This bridge is actually no longer weight bearing. A new steel girder superstructure was installed somewhat recently, and the old trusses were affixed to the sides to keep with the historic ambiance of the area. It must have been recently completed.

The mall at Kohls

The original truss was built in 1900.
Next to the bridge is the old Hixson-Skinner Grist Mill, built in the late 1700s and strengthened more recently. It appeared to be vacant, but still quite nice. I waited for a car to come by so it would provide enough light for me to get a good photo of it.
We continued down Still Valley Road to Municipal Road, and then turned to the right.
Municipal Road is busier and wider, and soon passes beneath a double stone culvert that carries both the road and the Pohatcong Creek beneath the former Lehigh Valley Railroad.

Sunset on Edge Road

Once we came out from under the culvert, we turned to the left through the grass onto a trail that follows the Pohatcong Creek adjacent to the municipal building property. It’s really a pretty nice stretch, wide and mowed off.

Hixson Skinner Grist Mill

We continued on this further than I usually do, because there seems to be a reasonable path.
There were some briars over much of it, but we were able to push on through along the creek until we got to the edge of the property. Then, we climbed back up hill to the municipal building and emerged behind several parked police cars.
We made our way out of the municipal garage area, and then turned left again on Municipal Road. This took us down hill and out to Rt 519 again.
The last time we went through here, dogs were barking like crazy, and some guy freaked out on some in the group for barking back at them. Of course, the dogs went nuts again as we walked by, but no one came out to talk to us.

Hixson-Skinner Grist Mill

We turned left on 519, in the settlement of Springtown.
We headed up hill slightly, and then turned right on Creek Road.
I’ve always loved this road. There’s barely any traffic, and it follows pretty closely to the Pohatcong Creek all the way out to the Delaware River. I’ve done a few hikes on it already (the funniest of which was when a farmer came out with a double barrel shot gun and a hound dog wondering who was walking on the road after dark). No one bothered us this time, and we wandered on through to where the road crossed over the creek to the right.

Still Valley historic marker

This time, rather than follow Creek Road further down, I wanted to check out a few other roads I’d never walked before.
We turned right and headed up hill on Winters Road. It was alright, but not really my favorite one.
The next road was really pretty nice: Snyders Road.
The road made its way west through some lovely farmlands, although it was again a very windy spot to deal with, and then continued down hill toward Carpentersville.
On the way down, we passed either a church or school house building on the left. I think it might be the Oak Grove No. 9 School as per the 1874 Beers Atlas of Warren County.

Coming out of the trail behind the municipal area

We came into the little settlement, which is the main area known as Carpentersville.
We crossed over the River Road, and then went back a dead end one that looks more like a driveway than anything else, and reached the Bel Del Railroad tracks. I pointed out where the old station platform used to be to the left, next to a large house, as we walked on by.
There is just a bit of a platform remaining of that station, with some railings today. There was enough ambient light from the house that we could see a little of it at this time. We turned right to follow the tracks north.

Historic image of Carpentersville Station area

We walked the tracks north, and River Road closely paralleled on the right of us.
Soon, we came to the rather new platform that was constructed for the Delaware River excursion on the right. We then came up close to a couple of houses that cross the tracks to reach their front porches. We quietly passed by these, and soon after River Road crossed the tracks over to the left. There is a quarry off to the right in this area, the sole customer remaining on the Bel Del in the southern part of Warren County.

Historic image of Carpentersville Station, 1906

We passed by some houses on the left, and soon the quarry spur from the right came in. Carpentersville Road then crossed the tracks to the right.

Ruins along the Bel Del, 2002

There was an abandoned house along the left side of the tracks here until recently, and I figured it might still be vacant. However, when we went by, there were two vehicles parked in the lot, and although there were no lights on, it looked like someone had been doing some work on it, which was good.
We continued ahead, and one more road crossed the tracks to reach several cottage buildings on the left. It looks like there is possibly an abandoned building off to the right of the tracks in this area, but we couldn’t see that well. I also wouldn’t trust that a ramshackle building in this part of the county is in fact abandoned. People live in some rough conditions in places like this.
We continued ahead, and then reached the spot with the enormous kilns on the right side. The railroad excursion had created a nice spot here for people to get out and check them out. I’d not seen it since they made this nice area through there yet.

Rt 78 bridge

We continued north, and I pointed out some brick ruins to the right of the rail bed that are not easily seen unless walking during the day.

Ruins along the Bel Del from my hike in Sept 2002

Justin commentd that he’d walked just about the entire Bel Del...all of it north of Phillipsburg, all of it south of Frenchtown, but that this stretch had somehow eluded him and that it was cooler than he’d anticipated it would be.
I pointed out where there are more ladders and such down along the river in this section and that it’s worth checking out when there’s more to see. I think there might also be more ruins up the slope, because at one time there used to be a few homes along I believe this very stream the ruins we stopped at were by. I never looked further up.

New construction

We continued under the Rt 78 bridge, which is always eerily amazing in the dark. We took a few photos, and then moved on.
I was amazed that by the next day when I posted the photo, Delaware River Joint Toll Bridge Commission offered me $75 for its use in their annual year in review report! Not too shabby!
We continued on to Phillipsburg, to where the Morris Canal came very close to the tracks. We descended from the tracks, then turned to the right from the access lane to reach the Morris Canal Greenway. We began to follow that back through Phillipsburg.

Construction

We first passed the filled in old aqueduct, and then continued out to the edge of South Main Street where Mayor Steve Ellis had the first section of the canal greenway developed with a crushed stone surface, parallel with the Lopatcong Creek. At many places through here, the canal and the creek were one.
We passed by Nortons and then through to Greens Bridge. We went beneath that, over the creek at the former site of Lock #10 West, and moved on ahead to turn left on Lock Street.
As we walked ahead, I pointed out the site of Lock #9 and how the road goes slightly up hill. The tender’s house for the lock is still standing on the right, although much altered.
We continued ahead from here, passed the Lock Street Field, and then I pointed out the former location of Lock #8 West. This one too has the lock house standing, though also altered. It’s kind of uncommon to find lock houses still in place like that.

Construction

In the western half of the state, lock houses for locks 9, 8, and 4 are the only ones still standing. I can’t remember any of them on the east half of the canal still standing, unless Peer’s Store was considered to be a lock house.
We continued along Lock Street and I pointed out Inclined Plane #10 West, followed by the original pre-1842 plane 10, which is now a driveway to the right of the road.
We continued along Lock Street further form here, and barely any cars if any at all passed us. They re-aligned Lock Street I understand at the end by Rt 22, but I haven’t checked that out yet. I figure people don’t know what happened there yet, so they haven’t bothered checking it out.

ham

We turned right on the somewhat restored canal at the new building development to the right, and climbed the slope through the new construction area.
There are a lot of new buildings going up through the area, and it won’t look the same way much longer.
The entire area of Lopatcong, Pohatcong, and Greenwich are going to be a mess of development in the near future. I can’t say that I really lament the end of the malls the way so many others do. Twenty years ago, we were shouting “no more malls”, and now everyone wants to keep them for nostalgia.
In all honestly, things like Amazon are employing people (although I understand they suck as an employer), and they actually create less traffic than what we would have if trucks had to deliver to each individual box store. The only place we have to be concerned is with the location of the distribution centers and warehouses. Interstate 78 can handle it, but 80 through the Delaware Water Gap cannot. My brother Alex thinks the mall area will become a major truck stop because there’s nothing really convenient between there and 78, and the nearest place they could go otherwise is over to the one in Bloomsbury. I think he may be right about that, but I suppose time will tell.

HAM