west paterson has changed its name to woodland park (Toms River: how much, school district)

[EEEPNJ]

Two elementary schools...Beatrice Gilmore is the better of the 2, and it's just ok. Carles Olbon ranks very badly. I'm 99% sure they go to Passaic Valley HS in Little Falls, which again is ok - not great.

[tahiti]

Long Hill Twsp in Morris County county used to be called Passaic Township and changed its' name for the same reason. Now, no-one knows or cares of its' previous name, except maybe to the old people - the old people like us who will always call "Woodland Park" West Paterson.

[lammius]

Originally Posted by HobokenGuy

West Orange will now be called West Apricot, and South Orange is now called South Fig.

Tryin' to keep it in the fruit family ova hea!

Then NJDOT will have to change all of the signs on Route 280 which read, "The Oranges," to "The Fruits." People might get the wrong idea!

[SilkCity0416]

ha! you made a funny!!

[natalayjones]

Originally Posted by EEEPNJ

NJ HAS TOO MANY TOWNS.

I had this same thought when I was looking for apartments. I would find one I like and it would say "south this" "old that" and I would think oh thats too far away. Then I'd mapquest it and it'd be on the other side of the highway.

[EEEPNJ]

Originally Posted by lammius

Then NJDOT will have to change all of the signs on Route 280 which read, "The Oranges," to "The Fruits." People might get the wrong idea!

LOL _ love the status statement btw...

[william boss]

Woodland park sounds like a cemitary .if you dont like west paterson what are you doing here. You can change the name but you cant change the people. We will still be west paterson.its not where you come from that counts .i dont care if i say im from west paterson and someone says oh your from paterson it dosnt change who i am,and if they think differant thats thier problem.

[jyoung07424]

Originally Posted by pbergen

thoughts?

NorthJersey.com: West Paterson no more

they've tried to change the name of the town every 5-6 years or so, but the referendums always failed. i'm surprised that it actually got approved this time.

I moved to West Paterson 11 years ago and heard about this issue. At the time, I didn't really have much of an opinion about a name change but thought it might be nice if, whatever the change would be might include some reference to Garrett Mountain. Apparently, as in East Paterson changing to Elmwood Park, they wanted to retain the first initials of West Paterson hence this Woodland Park choice.

However, when I "googled" the name Woodland Park, this is what came up!!
Woodland Park is a community or populated place (Class Code U6) located in Union County at latitude 40.703 and longitude -74.379. The elevation is 476 feet. Woodland Park appears on the Chatham U.S. Geological Survey Map. Union County is in the Eastern time zone (GMT -5).

I realize this is a very new Name Change for West Paterson, but it would seem that someone in the newly elected city government should start to get all these references corrected.

Also, I'm wondering if there's ANY CHANCE the the Postal Service will now consider a new zip code for Woodland Park to lessen the confusion that already exists by two different towns (Little Falls) having to share the same numbers?

I wasn't surprised that the name change conflict finally tipped in favor of the new name, considering the influx of new residents in the Rolling Views Condo Complex and the new Retirement Community overlooking Rte 46. They are obviously concerned about the Real Estate value of their new investments.

In any case, good luck to the residents of Woodland Park, NJ. Let's hope that this name change will benefit the town as we move forward.

[STrapani1105]

Originally Posted by tahiti

Long Hill Twsp in Morris County county used to be called Passaic Township and changed its' name for the same reason. Now, no-one knows or cares of its' previous name, except maybe to the old people - the old people like us who will always call "Woodland Park" West Paterson.

i never knew that, i live right near there.

i think this name change is both good and bad. just how everything has good parts and bad. West Paterson is a historical name so that kind of ruins it. But all my life, I've know East Paterson as Elmwood Park, so that kind of fits me well. this change with West Paterson is going to be difficult to accustom to.

they say it will increase property value and it will get the town to disassociate itself from the city of Paterson. black and hispanic residents of Paterson have called the name change "racist" because WP is mostly white and they see it as an attempt for the white folk to dissassociate themselves from Paterson, which is more diverse. and u know, Paterson is really cleaning itself up. they didn't really need to change the name.

[SilkCity0416]

If you look at the history of West Paterson, it was once a part of Little Falls, then it broke off to form it's own township and was called " West Park". Then after the turn of the century, West Park changed it's name to "West Paterson". At the time, Paterson was a city that had a thriving economy. The samething happend with Elmwood Park ( East Paterson ). I'm not all that big of a fan of name changes. Because at the end of the day, you are who you are.