A members-only shooting range that’s operated in Gloucester Township for more than three-quarters of a century is fighting a lawsuit that could put it out of business — the latest in a long line of pressure that tends to show up right about the time the surrounding land gets valuable.
Iron Horse Rifle & Pistol Club has run rifle, pistol, and archery ranges on the Waddell family’s farmland off Garwood Road, in the township’s Erial section, since the late 1940s. Its neighbors are the newcomers. As 55-and-older developments like Four Seasons at Forest Meadows rose around it over the past two decades, residents repeatedly pushed the township to restrict or close the range over noise and stray-round complaints — a fight that boiled over into a 2013 homeowner lawsuit and years of township hearings. Grandfathered in long before the subdivisions arrived, the range kept operating. It’s the same slow squeeze TTAG has documented again and again: a range built out in the country, then hemmed in by houses whose owners decide the guns have to go.
This time the challenge comes from a developer.
The Lawsuit
According to a complaint filed in Camden County Superior Court, Bryn Mawr Garwood LLC — a company New Jersey business records list as newly formed in 2026, with Pennsylvania real-estate attorney Harvey Sternberg as its principal — is suing the entity that runs the range, Iron Horse R&R LLC.
The suit rests on environmental allegations: that the range has engaged in “solid waste disposal and soil stockpiling” and hauled stockpiles, asphalt millings, construction debris, and “potentially contaminated soil, from unknown sources” onto the adjoining property.
The complaint’s own hedging stands out. “Potentially contaminated” recurs throughout, and the filing concedes the soil at issue “has not been tested.” For a case premised on contamination, that’s a conspicuous gap — a basic lead screen runs about $18 at the Rutgers Soil Testing Laboratory, with a fuller workup running a few thousand.
The Range’s Response
Iron Horse casts the environmental theory as a pretext for a land grab, arguing the plaintiff’s real aim is to force the range dark so the neighboring Waddell parcel can be redeveloped. Its attorney, Mark Karpo — who isn’t licensed in New Jersey and has applied to appear pro hac vice — says the club served discovery seeking any expert reports behind the contamination claims and got nothing back.
A Familiar Playbook
However this shakes out, the shape is one gun owners know well. Ranges rarely die by a dramatic vote; they get zoned, sued, and studied out of existence, usually because they lack the money to outlast the litigation even when they’d ultimately win. Many states have responded with range-protection statutes that shield grandfathered ranges from exactly these nuisance-and-zoning plays — New Jersey’s protections are thinner than most. Public campaign-finance records filed with NJ ELEC can establish whether, and how much, the plaintiff has given to local officials; that’s worth reporting as a plain fact, without asserting a connection the record doesn’t prove.
Buy em out. Everything is for sale. At the right price.
All the NJ lefties and DSA types will be sure to join the local range full of sportsmen and conservationists and fight against the evil real estate developer wanting to clear cut the land for cold profit, right? RIGHT?
There is actually a legal concept that addresses this: “coming to the nuisance.”
If a lawful use of property existed before you purchased neighboring property, the fact that you later find that existing use objectionable does not automatically give you the right to force it to change or shut down.
The classic example is buying a home next to an existing farm and then complaining about the noise, odors, equipment, or livestock. The fact that the farm was already there and that you knew or reasonably should have known about its operations when you purchased the property is highly relevant in a nuisance dispute.
The same principle applies to an established shooting range.
If the range was lawfully operating before you purchased the neighboring property, its existence and the ordinary noise associated with its operation were conditions you knew, or reasonably should have known, existed when you chose to buy there.
In legal terms, “coming to the nuisance” is not an absolute defense in every jurisdiction or under every set of facts. A property owner generally cannot use it as permission to substantially expand, materially change, or unlawfully operate a nuisance.
But that’s very different from knowingly purchasing property next to a pre-existing, lawfully operating range and then demanding that the range alter or cease the same type of operation that existed when you bought the property.
Put simply: you bought next to the range; the range didn’t move in next to you. The law can take that distinction seriously.
Which is what the adjoining property owners tried, but they apparently failed. The new tact is to force an environmental review that is intended to support the proposition that the property is contaminated and therefore a nuisance. If proven–which requires expert testimony based on an examination of the property–would force a closure of the range. Then the developer could try to purchase it from the owner.
Xrimg is spot on! The gun club I belong to has been a fixture in its town for at least 75 yrs. Pistol range, trap, archery, fishing pond a 100 yd rifle range and then the newer rifle range that has berms at 100, 200, and 300 yds.
They fought a long court fight with the neighbors to the left and parallel to that range, several yrs in fact.
The neighbors claimed they could “hear” the bullets whizzing by; you can’t see the houses from the range.
Surveys, studies, impact and it finally boiled down to the club was not only there first, they homeowners should have known that when they built or moved in.
Club won.
Legalizing and encouraging the use of suppressors would mitigate the noise, but that would mean they would have to stop being dickheads in Trenton.
New Jersey sucks out loud. Why would they stop being dickheads? They are voted into office by the voters of the state; many of whom can’t read or do basic math, and don’t know the history of the country.
New Jersey got what it wanted. Dumb voters and chaos.
Great article!
Here’s the reality whether you like it or not: As areas build up, you’re no longer allowed to have nice things. Got five acres? Oh, sorry, you can’t keep your dirtbike track or your personal archery range. They’ll find a way to make sure you don’t.
Urban or suburban, the vast majority of the people are trash. 90%+ Karens and Kens.
And don’t get me started on the 55+ “communities”. I used to live near one and holy Hell, what a concentration of utter shitbags those places attract. Exactly the type to complain that they never see their grandkids but also never even attempt to do so and then complain if the neighbor’s have grandkids in the front yard.
Nothing dumber than a fool with money who has a big house built on a 1/2 acre subdivision lot located way off in the country. And then wants to stick their nose in everyone’s business like they are experts in rural living…All hat and no cattle.
On the other hand, there are rich guy playgrounds built in the middle of multi-generational homes in quiet communities…like the Sawmill Tactical Training Center.
They hosted the last Knob Creek there, starting more than a dozen fires, hitting neighboring houses hundreds of time and almost burned up the fire truck sent to help them. They were ordered by the Sheriff to stop and they continued all night. They land helicopters and shoot machine guns whenever they want. The nuisance moved right into the middle of people who don’t deserve it’s homes.
But why are the neighbors REALLY upset since most of them hate gun control?
Because the range floods, carrying all that primer Lead dust and buried Lead from bullet cores from millions of rounds into their water table…for thousands of years. And what is the safe amount of Lead in your water, we ask? It’s zero…
If you do that, you’re an a$$hole and you should be gone.
There was a situation where people were moving in next to Luke AFB and complaining about the F15 noise. How frickkin stupid do you have to be to think that’s a good idea. Money sucking developers thought they could get Uncle Sam to stop freedom or something! The states that were ground zero for freedom have turned into shit.
Does anyone remember Marine Corps Air Stations El Toro and Tustin that were located in Orange County California? Under the guise of Base Realignment and Closure (BRAC) in 1999 both were closed in favor of County/State/Federal redistribution. Prime real estate sold/granted to curry election favors.
Personally I find the crack of a round going down-range as pleasant as hearing a F-18 in full afterburners on take off. Okay, you can retire the kid from the Marines but you can’t remove the Marines from a somewhat older kid. Semper Fi.