In Montreal, every­one knows that the first sign of summer is the arrival of the Grande Prix, a formula one race which takes over every aspect of the city for a long weekend. Downtown the streets are filled with people, and race cars line one of the main streets for everyone to walk along and take a firsthand look. Ferraris, Mercedeses, McClar­ens, and so many others in their shiniest best are open to the public to admire. Music blasts from the streets and we remember one Motzei Shabbat when we went downtown to partic­ipate in the weekend excitement and we had to leave because the vibrations from the music were so loud that we could feel our bodies pul­sating. It was not our speed! The climax is on the Sunday when the race actually takes place.

Our interest in such events was probably at the bottom of our “bucket list” in life. To us a safe car that got us to where we needed to go was all that really mattered. Excess speed, although we can be as guilty as others when driving long distances, is something we work to keep in control.

How surprising it has been to us that we ended up moving to a home which is directly on a speedway.

New Bridge Road, we were told, is a con­venient, wonderful street to live on, in close proximity to two shuls. It will be the first street to be plowed during a snow storm. Snow? We were told there is none in this community and that is why Nina’s concern about having a foy­er in the front of our house was always negat­ed by the real estate agent. Boy, did we learn quickly last winter when our area had more snow than they had in Montreal. Getting back to the speedway we live on, we have now mas­tered the art of getting in and out of the drive­way. It is not an easy feat. Rarely will anyone stop to let us out. It has made us more tolerant of allowing others we see who are trying to get out of shopping malls, driveways, etc.

Try turning from Westminster Gate onto Newbridge—another major test of our pa­tience. What happened to common courte­sy? Even more challenging is crossing the cor­ner to get to the Beth Abraham side of the street. There is a stop sign indicating that one has to stop for pedestrians, a stop sign that no one stops for. The biggest joke was our grand­daughter waiting to cross and a police car driv­ing by without stopping. Even more danger­ous and aggravating is when one car stops to let people go across and another car passes around him to get ahead putting the lives of everyone who is about to cross in danger.

For us, however, the most alarming as­pect of living in this neighborhood is the lack of street lights. Of course, the time that most of us walk at night is on a Shabbat or a Yom Tov when we are either returning from shul or from being invited to a home for a seudah late at night. What is wrong with this town? Many times in the winter we have walked home through snow and ice unable to see three feet in front of us and tumbling into a pile of leaves or sliding on a piece of black ice. On Newbridge itself, the only way you can see while walking at night on the totally broken sidewalks (due to the branches of trees which have lifted the cement) is when the headlights of a car come along to give you temporary relief.

Something must be done. We have tried to figure out what solutions we residents can come up with to improve this situa­tion. Of course, we can petition the cities that we live in and can fight for the lights. We also think that when putting up a new house in the area—and we all know that none of them appear to be too small— owners should be required to install street lights on their properties. With tiles be­ing imported, kitchens being custom, and built-ins in every room, surely there must be some place in the budget for street lights.

It is now time to brighten the streets of Bergenfield and Teaneck so that one should not have to be afraid to walk here at night. Tragic accidents have happened in every community and it seems as though one is asking to happen here. The light that shines in all of the batei midrashim here needs to extend to the practical as well. Let’s work on this project and make it happen.

By Rabbi Mordechai and Nina Glick