Our state has a lot of Revolutionary history to celebrate this year. European settlers first landed on the Atlantic coast before moving across the continent, and much of New Jersey was already settled by 1776. We are between the much younger West Coast, where buildings from the mid1800s are considered very old, and Europe, where there are still some buildings from a few centuries before that. There is much to explore here in the Garden State, and those who do not drive are as deserving of seeing these historic sites as motorists are. To make it easy to find sites accessible by public transit, NJ Transit has created a web page, “Jersey Journeys”, with an interactive map, which also points to RevNJ.org, which describes itself as “a partnership between the New Jersey Historical Commission (NJHC), a division of the New Jersey Department of State, and the nonprofit Crossroads of the American Revolution Association to plan the commemoration of the 250th anniversary of the American Revolution in New Jersey.” As I type this article, there are 167 days until the big celebration on July 4th, 2026.
Site Structure
Once back on “Jersey Journeys”—the link is actually www.njtransit.com/journeys (“Jersey”implied), one can select by category of featured location (e.g., revolutionary site, architecture, activity, train station, monuments, or parks), by mode of transportation (bus, rail, or light rail), or by location (municipality and/or county). One can combine these as one chooses or make a single choice of filter.
The map itself takes up the right side of the screen, and I was unable to shrink it to fit completely in my Firefox browser window on a MacBookPro 14″ laptop, and the feature descriptions were below the map, encroaching on what one would have expected to be map space. On duck-duck-go, the site fared better; though slow to load, the filters are to the left, the featured sites to the right, and the map showed up quite a bit smaller, with the entire state as well as parts of our neighboring states visible. Safari was quicker to load, but had the better layout of duck-duck-go. As I went to close the page, I noted the message “For the best experience on mobile, use Full Screen mode”, which sent me to an arcgis page. As I was on a laptop, I could not really evaluate how the site would look on a phone, but shrinking the screen to a narrower size did bring back the issues I first noted on Firefox.
Exploring the Site
Each category has an icon: tickets, cannon, tree, etc., and clicking on an icon opens a panel over the right side of the map with name, transit options, business address, web site URL, link to directions on Google, photo, short description, and a photo credit. Unfortunately, the first icon I clicked (Greenwich, Cumberland County: Tea Burners’ monument) had no transit options available, which kind-of defeats the purpose of the page. Next, I clicked on the Long-a-Coming Depot in Berlin, Camden County: once, but no longer, an Atlantic City Line stop. Bus lines listed are the 340 and the 554. Unfortunately, those lines are not linked to any listing on the NJT site; one must do a separate search for details. The Clara Barton Schoolhouse in Bordentown (Burlington County), lists one bus line, no light rail. Knowing that there is a Bordentown stop on the light rail, I clicked the Google link for directions, and was brought not to 109 E. Burlington Street, but 19 E. Burlington Street. Forging ahead, Google did indeed give me a bus connection from Trenton, but choosing the option of light rail did give me an option, albeit a 0.7 mile walk. I saw the point; that is fairly long. Next, I went to the NJT trip planner—again leaving on a Friday at 2 p.m., the first choice was indeed the light rail, with its 0.7 mile from #19. Interestingly, the light rail—not even mentioned on Jersey Journeys—was cheaper and faster than the bus, 11 minutes to 29, 85¢ to $1.15.
I really don’t mean to complain. This is a fun page, and just reading the capsule descriptions provides fun facts—who knew that some South Jersey folks had their own Tea Party in 1774, one year after the Boston act of resistance that inspired it? Now I do, and if I can get to Cumberland County, I’ll check out the monument. Could it be better? Sure, but NJT is a transit agency, not a travel service, so I’ll give them some credit for getting into the celebratory spirit in our country’s 250th year.
Transit to Trails
In addition to “Jersey Journeys”, NJ Transit also has another page of special-interest transit access: “Transit to Trails: Giving Everyone Access to the Great Outdoors”. Lackawanna Coalition Secretary Daniel Chazin does a lot of hiking, often combined with a rail-fan trip, and we’ve asked him for his thoughts on that page, which we will report in a future issue.
Leave a Reply