"Premature" or "Paper" Subdivision"

"Premature" or "Paper" Subdivision. This area was part of a premature or paper subdivision of lands offered for sale by James Realty Company and filed in the Somerset County Clerks Office on June 1, 1911 as "Bound Brook Manor". Current land use regulations require a developer to guarantee that the streets and other infrastructure be complete or bonded prior to selling the building lots. However, this was not always the case. It used to be possible to dedicate new streets and create lots that had no supporting improvements. Sometimes when this happened the improvements were never built and the land remained vacant. If the owners of the lots stop paying their taxes, the township, county, or Board of Education can take ownership of the lot.

Copied from the 1950 Tax Map

    In this case there were 583 lots created, each about 20 feet wide and 100 feet deep, totaling 26.77 acres. The intent was to sell the lots in groups. So for example, if you wanted a lot 80 feet wide you would buy four lots.

    There were also nine "paper streets" which exist only on paper. They are: Amherst Ave., Amos Ave., Bucknell St., Clinton Ave., Colgate St., Lafayette St., Lehigh Ave., and Western Parkway. The trail generally follows Lafayette Street. One of the reasons they were never improved was that they did not connect to any other public road but were landlocked.

Lafayette (formerly Frank) Street is the road closest to the right side.

This subdivision will remain on the Township maps until the lots are merged and the paper streets are vacated. When the Township vacates a street, it gives up its rights to the right of way and the ownership of the land is given back to whoever owns the adjoining property from which the right of way was created.

Check the huge shag bark hickory on the north side of the trail.