Marlene Resciniti has lived on Hromiak Terrace in Woodland Park long enough to know exactly what happens when Dowling Brook rises, and she says her neighborhood floods directly because of it. Years after officials say the Peckman River flood tunnel project was approved, Resciniti and her neighbors are still waiting for a shovel to hit dirt, and Woodland Park Mayor Tracy Kallert says she understands the frustration all too well.
Despite earlier funding announcements, the tunnel remains in the study phase, Woodland Park Mayor Tracy Kallert told TAPinto. The proposed route would pass through Little Falls Township to reduce flash flooding in the Dowling area. Resident Marlene Resciniti said the project was approved five years earlier and that, since then, she has repeatedly sought updates from elected officials' offices. She told TAPinto she called the congresswoman's office three times and Rep. Mikie Sherrill's office twice without receiving a promised callback.
A Tunnel Still Stuck in Study
The latest study status Kallert described was 30 percent complete. She said that was what officials were told at an Army Corps of Engineers discussion roughly two or three months before her comments to TAPinto. Kallert also said Little Falls has taken the lead on tunnel-location matters and that local officials want the project's status verified. Woodland Park has no firm construction timeline; officials had been told work might begin in 2027, though Kallert said they would be fortunate to see it start that year even after funding went through.
Kallert said she believed the issue originated about a decade earlier and that Little Falls officials share Woodland Park's frustration with the pace of progress. She said Woodland Park planned to contact Little Falls to request another meeting with the Army Corps and clarify the project's status and remaining steps before construction. Kallert also planned to call for an update that week and encouraged Resciniti and other residents to bring questions to borough officials ahead of the next discussion.
Funding Fight Dates Back Years
The push for funding has a long history. According to the New Jersey Globe, the fight for funding of the Peckman River Basin project began in the previous decade. Former Rep. Bill Pascrell said at one point that the feasibility study was complete and the project authorized, stating, “We finally have the feasibility study complete and the project authorized.” The Globe also reported that Sherrill pointed to “the announcement of full federal funding,” and that the Army Corps had agreed to fund a $146.2 million flood-mitigation project for the Peckman River Basin covering Woodland Park and Little Falls.
Those figures build on an earlier draft plan. A 2019 Army Corps proposal described in a report by NorthJersey.com called for a double box diversion culvert, or tunnel structure, built under roadways to divert floodwater from the Peckman River into the Passaic River. That culvert was described as 1,500 feet long and 40 feet in diameter, with an estimated project cost at the time of about $172 million, including roughly $112 million from the federal government. The plan also called for about 2,170 linear feet of levees or floodwalls, with another 1,207 feet near Little Falls High School, and the elevation of as many as 16 structures.
Local Leaders Have Long Backed the Plan
Then-Woodland Park Mayor Keith Kazmark said at the time that he believed the report's recommendations matched what both towns had been asking for, telling NorthJersey.com that “we believe that the recommendations in the report are on point as to what Woodland Park and Little Falls have been asking for.” Little Falls Mayor James Damiano also said he supported the project, though he questioned whether it would move water to the Passaic River any faster, the outlet reported. At the time, engineers said they planned to spend the following month soliciting public comments before finalizing the project.
Flood Records Offer Broader Context
A 2014 U.S. Geological Survey study, conducted with the New Jersey Department of Environmental Protection, created flood-inundation maps for an approximately 7.5-mile stretch of the Peckman River, from Verona to its confluence with the Passaic River in Woodland Park. The maps estimate inundation extent and depth at selected water levels, according to the U.S. Geological Survey. Separately, NorthJersey.com reported that during the September 2021 remnants of Hurricane Ida, cars were swept from an apartment-complex parking lot in Little Falls. That dated incident is distinct from the recurring Dowling Brook flooding described by Woodland Park residents; it does not establish its cause or show how those risks compare with flooding on the Passaic River.
For residents like Resciniti, whose neighborhood sits in the path of repeated flash flooding from Dowling Brook, the gap between those early assurances and the tunnel's current 30 percent study status is the crux of the frustration. Kallert said the completed tunnel is still expected to prevent flash flooding in the Dowling area once built, but with no firm construction timeline and funding details that have shifted since the original 2019 estimate, residents in the area say they are left waiting for answers that keep getting delayed.
