“I call Bottle Hill an ‘intentional neighborhood,’” says resident Kathy Sulo. “It’s not always easy to meet neighbors, but shared interests like the Friends of Bottle Hill bring us together, and bi-weekly meetings keep us connected.”
There are no cul-de-sacs in Bottle Hill—and not a lot of back-fence socializing, either. This dauntingly linear residential district, listed in the National Register of Historic Places, is bisected by Ridgedale Avenue, a noisy vehicular stream that flows past the housing of three centuries. Ridgedale started as a path for the Lenape tribe and was later an important Revolutionary-era thoroughfare. (The borough of Bottle Hill was renamed for James Madison in 1834.) Houses include 18th-century “East Jersey Cottages” and 19th-century styles ranging from Italianate to Queen Anne. More recent suburban types include the Dutch Colonials common in the state.
