It’s hard to see any beauty or natural wonder in a narrow, one-block alley paved with asphalt.
The one behind John Swem’s Trenton home, Sage Alley, makes him smile widely nevertheless.
He no longer sees an overgrown, unpassable and ignored pathway that got so unkempt that people used it as a garbage dumping ground. And he can literally see clearly to the other end, to Dover Alley.
He also sees a victorious end to his 14-year, bureaucratic battle to have the city clear and pave Sage Alley – one of the last grass alleys in the city.
With patience and persistence, Swem navigated four mayors, several council members and numerous other officials in his red tape-cutting effort.
In late October, the retired state employee saw paving machines clearing the alley, and could hardly believe it. Weeks later, the city laid the asphalt. On Monday, he happily showed off the work to NJ Advance Media.
“I’m very, very happy,” Swem said.
He said city workers even cleaned up and repaved portions of the connecting Putnam Alley – a bonus. “I was really surprised at that.”
Now, when he opens the rear fence gate behind his Emmett Avenue home, he confidently walks into a space where he no longer wonders what’s under his feet.
“They did a good job,” he said.
Swem’s work to have the alley paved started in early 2008.
The alley runs behind Emmet and Kearney avenues, between Park and South Olden avenues in the Villa Park neighborhood. Swem grew up in his home. For years, the formerly grass alley was just an alley.
In the mid 2000s, he watched it deteriorate as some residents and the city ignored its upkeep.
He started writing letters to local officials, and state representatives as a backup, asking for it to be paved. Often, city leaders, and even then state Assemblyman Reed Gusciora – now the city’s mayor – wrote back that Sage Alley was on the city’s list for paving.
Also writing back was then Trenton public works director, Eric Jackson, who also went on to be mayor, from 2014 to 2018.
It never happened. Years went by. The weeds grew. And Swem wrote more letters.
In 2015, though, when he saw garbage and other discarded materials being dumped, he stepped up his campaign.
When a few more years of inaction, Swem contacted NJ Advance Media in 2018, which first wrote about the alley in July of that year.
By then the alley was “disgusting,” and he showed off the stack of letters he’d compiled from officials, many which promised action, and never followed through.
In April 2019, the city hastily added Sage Alley to its paving list, but that never happened either.
After the news coverage, Swem said he got some pushback from some neighbors, who argued that the alley, while not so pretty, was a good defense to speedy vehicles, and maybe some natural security to anyone on foot.
Swem disagreed then and now.
First, he said an unpassable alley is not a good alley, and it was an environmental eyesore, as the overgrown brush was often riddled with bugs, rodents and trash.
He said Monday the overall reason for his unyielding pressure was that the city said, in 2008, they would do the job.
Other wards in the city, Swem said, were getting projects done, and he felt the East Ward was not receiving its fair share of attention from the city. “I just felt like we were getting screwed,” he said.
“That’s why I kept on doing it,” he said Monday of his letter writing. From time to time, Swem would go to City Hall and query public works officials on the status as well,
He said other Emmett Avenue residents helped in the cause, and East Ward Councilman Joe Harrison, elected in 2018, was “very helpful” in pushing through the final effort to put Sage Alley on the paving list.
Swem said his 14-year campaign has led some to see if he’d be interested in running for office.
While he said he’s do almost anything to help his neighborhood, and city, he’ll stick with similar, civic-minded projects.
“That’s good enough for me.”
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Kevin Shea may be reached at kshea@njadvancemedia.com.
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