Avenel station

Avenel is an unincorporated community and census-designated place (CDP) located within Woodbridge Township, in Middlesex County, in the U.S. state of New Jersey. Avenel is approximately 25 miles (40 km) southwest of Midtown Manhattan along the North Jersey Coast rail line As of the 2020 United States census, the CDP's population was 16,920, a decrease of 91 (−0.5%) from the 17,011 recorded at the 2010 census, which in turn had reflected a decline of 541 (−3.1%) from the 17,552 counted in the 2000 census.

Edgars or Edgar is an unincorporated community located within Woodbridge Township in Middlesex County, in the U.S. state of New Jersey. It approximately includes the area around Woodbridge High School over to Rahway Avenue, south of the Port Reading Railroad. The upper section of Ridgedale Avenue is known as Edgar's Hill. There was a Pennsylvania Railroad stop called Edgars approximately where Prospect Avenue would cross the railway, steps for this are still visible on the western side as of 2016.

The Adult Diagnostic and Treatment Center (ADTC) is a secure correctional facility operated by the New Jersey Department of Corrections. Its purpose is to provide treatment and incarceration for certain criteria meeting repetitive and compulsive male sex offenders who have been sentenced under the New Jersey Sex Offender Act.From its opening in 1976 through at least 1994, ADTC is a unique facility, the "only complex of its kind in the nation devoted exclusively to the treatment of adult sexual offenders". The facility is located in the Avenel section of Woodbridge Township, New Jersey and in close proximity to East Jersey State Prison aka Rahway State Prison. Prior to the opening of the Avenel facility, the program occupied a housing unit at East Jersey State Prison known as "5-Wing". ADTC houses and treats two groups of men: 1. Certain convicted sex offenders willing to engage in treatment who have been sentenced by the Court under the New Jersey Sex Offender Act to serve their sentences at the facility, and 2. Men who are not sentenced under the New Jersey Sex Offender Act, but have committed a sex offense. As of 1/1/2013, the facility had a population of 681.

Woodbridge High School is a four-year comprehensive public high school located in Woodbridge Township, in Middlesex County, New Jersey, serving students in ninth through twelfth grades as part of the Woodbridge Township School District. The high school is one of three in the district, together with Colonia High School and John F. Kennedy Memorial High School. The school has been accredited by the Middle States Association of Colleges and Schools Commission on Elementary and Secondary Schools since 1928.As of the 2021–22 school year, the school had an enrollment of 1,577 students and 131.6 classroom teachers (on an FTE basis), for a student–teacher ratio of 12.0:1. There were 415 students (26.3% of enrollment) eligible for free lunch and 101 (6.4% of students) eligible for reduced-cost lunch.

The Special Treatment Unit is a facility in which civilly committed sex offenders are held, pursuant to the New Jersey Sexually Violent Predator Act of 1998 (N.J.S.A. 30:4-27.24 to -27.38). It is operated by the New Jersey Department of Corrections, and is located in a separate building within East Jersey State Prison in Avenel, New Jersey. It is near the Adult Diagnostic and Treatment Center, New Jersey's center for incarcerated sex offenders, also in Avenel. Residents of the three facilities interact only with the residents in their own facility. In 2016, its population was 428. Since the program's inception in 1999 (at a different location), about 15% of the 579 sex offenders who were civilly committed in New Jersey have been discharged to the community after treatment. The state estimated in 2016 that there were 15 patients at Avenel who were convicted as juveniles but were sent to Avenel, indefinitely, once they completed their sentences. Public defenders and attorneys for the residents put the number at 30.In 2016, Gary Lanigan, the Commissioner of the New Jersey Department of Corrections, and a host of others were hit with a class action suit filed by detainees. They claim their civil rights are violated because they are not provided "adequate and meaningful mental health treatment" (necessary for their possible release) due to "systematic deficiencies." The complaint also says that in addition to the reportedly inadequate treatment, plaintiffs have "been confined in punitive conditions" that overstep the goal of the Sexually Violent Predator Act. Plaintiffs seek redress for the defendants’ alleged preference to "warehouse" such offenders out of sight in an attempt to indefinitely detain and punish, rather than treat supposed mental disabilities. "Individual counseling" at the facility is described as "uncommon".

Jonathan Singletary Dunham House, located in Woodbridge Township in Middlesex County, New Jersey, the state's first township, chartered on June 1, 1669, by King Charles II, is a house that was built around 1709 by Jonathan Singletary Dunham (January 17, 1640 – September 6, 1724), an early American settler and freeholder who built the first gristmill in New Jersey nearby the house.Jonathan Dunham was born in Newbury, Massachusetts and married Mary Bloomfield with whom he later moved to present day New Jersey. Bloomfield is a relative of Joseph Bloomfield, Governor of New Jersey, for whom the township of Bloomfield, New Jersey is named. After building the first gristmill in New Jersey, he went on to serve the community in a variety of ways and was elected to the New Jersey Provincial Congress in 1673. Jonathan Singletary Dunham was an ancestor of President Barack Obama.

East Jersey State Prison (formally referred to as "Rahway State Prison") is a medium-security prison operated by the New Jersey Department of Corrections in Avenel, Woodbridge Township, New Jersey. It was established in 1896 as Rahway State Prison, and was the first reformatory in New Jersey, officially opening in 1901. It housed 1,227 inmates as of 2020.

First Presbyterian Church and Cemetery is located at 600 Rahway Avenue in Woodbridge Township, Middlesex County, New Jersey, United States, one of the first townships established in the state at the end of the 17th century. It congregation was founded in 1675. The property was added to the National Register of Historic Places on May 2, 2008.

Trinity Episcopal Church is a historic church located at 650 Rahway Avenue in Woodbridge Township of Middlesex County, New Jersey. The third church at this location, it was added to the National Register of Historic Places on May 12, 2004, for its significance in architecture and religion.

The Barron Library is a historic building located at 582 Rahway Avenue in Woodbridge Township of Middlesex County, New Jersey. Formerly a public library, it is now the Barron Arts Center. The building was documented by the Historic American Buildings Survey in 1976. It was added to the National Register of Historic Places on November 11, 1977, for its significance in architecture and education.

Woodbridge is a commuter railroad station in Woodbridge Township, Middlesex County, New Jersey, United States. Located on NJ Transit's North Jersey Coast Line, it is one of three active railroad stations in the eponymous township, including Avenel to the north on the same line and Metropark station on the Northeast Corridor Line. Woodbridge station is located on Pearl Street at the intersection with Brook Street, where stairs to the single island platform that serves trains are located. Railroad service through downtown Woodbridge began on October 11, 1864, with the opening of the Perth Amboy and Woodbridge Railroad, a branch of the New Jersey Railroad, which would become the Pennsylvania Railroad. The first station depot was built in 1873 and was built at a level where the train cars would meet the platform at level. Discussions began in March 1882 to replace the depot. Following approval from Pennsylvania Railroad officials, construction on the new depot began in April 1885 and finished in August 1885. The idea of elevating the tracks to eliminate grade crossings in Woodbridge began in 1934 after the death of a local resident at the Green Street crossing on January 27. After attaining funds from the Public Works Administration, construction on the new elevated tracks began on September 8, 1938, with the first train operating over the current alignment on February 16, 1940. NJ Transit did their own reconstruction project, starting in September 2005, and being completed in mid-2007.

Woodbridge Township is a township in northern Middlesex County, in the U.S. state of New Jersey. The township is a regional hub of transportation and commerce for central New Jersey and a major bedroom suburb of New York City, within the New York metropolitan area. Located within the core of the Raritan Valley region, Woodbridge Township hosts the junction of the New Jersey Turnpike and the Garden State Parkway, the two busiest highways in the state, and also serves as the headquarters for the New Jersey Turnpike Authority, which operates both highways.As of the 2020 United States census, the township was the state's seventh-most-populous municipality, with a population of 103,639, its highest decennial count ever and an increase of 4,054 (+4.1%) from the 99,585 recorded at the 2010 census, which in turn reflected an increase of 2,382 (+2.5%) from the 97,203 counted in the 2000 census. Woodbridge was the state's sixth-largest by population in 2000 and 2010.According to historian Joshua Coffin, the community's early settlers included: Captain John Pike, the ancestor of General Zebulon Montgomery Pike, who was killed at the battle of Queenstown in 1813; Thomas Bloomfield, the ancestor of Joseph Bloomfield, some years governor of New Jersey, for whom the township of Bloomfield is named; John Bishop, senior and junior; Jonathan Haynes; Henry Jaques; George March; Stephen Kent; Abraham Toppan, junior; Elisha Ilsley; Hugh March; John Bloomfield; Samuel Moore; Nathaniel Webster; John Ilsley; and others." Woodbridge was the site of the first gristmill in New Jersey. The mill was built by Jonathan Singletary Dunham, who was married to Mary Bloomfield, relative of Joseph Bloomfield.