TOD-N Ordinance Up Tonight

A controversial ordinance setting land use parameters for a section of South Avenue will be up for first reading at tonight’s City Council meeting.

The meeting is 8 p.m. in Municipal Court, 325 Watchung Ave.

At last Monday’s agenda session, Planning Director William Nierstedt told the governing body that the TOD-N ordinance reflects Planning Board objectives for the site and that council approval would set standards for development there. The target area includes the former G.O. Keller dry-cleaning site at South and Leland avenues. Nierstedt said the Planning Board has reviewed the ordinance “at least four times,” a comment backed up by the council’s current Planning Board liaison, Councilman William Reid.

But Councilman Cory Storch, who voiced objections to the proposed ordinance in July, asked why it did not cover the south side of South Avenue and properties north past the train tracks of the Raritan Valley Line.

In past talks on transit-oriented development, four zones around two existing and two former train stations were delineated, with half- quarter-mile radii around each.

At the Aug. 11 agenda session, Storch challenged the proposal, saying, “This is really what is called spot zoning,” and called for a “visioning process” to determine what residents want for the neighborhood.

“I advocate that we send this back,” Storch said, suggesting the Planning Board had not dealt with the rest of the zone around the Netherwood train station.

But Reid noted the Planning Board had already spent many hours of discussion on the topic.

Reid, who served as campaign treasurer for Mayor Sharon Robinson-Briggs, was appointed to the council late last year to replace Rayland Van Blake, who became a Union County freeholder. He was also appointed council liaison to the Planning Board in January, replacing Storch. Board members also include the mayor’s confidential aide and one of her bodyguards.

The TOD-N ordinance permits buildings up to five stories high and a density of up to 75 units per acre for mixed use structures. One parking space and one bike rack per unit would be required.

Dennis Cooper of Omni Pointe, an Ohio firm that has presented a conceptual plan for a development in the proposed zone, said Friday the plan calls for a 5-story structure with 224 units and 30,000 square feet of retail space. Cooper said the company is “very hopeful” that construction can begin by March or April. The company does not yet own the G.O. Keller site, but is in negotiations with the owner, he said.

The current density in the neighborhood is 25 units per acre, but the increased height and density is in keeping with transit-oriented development standards that allow for such changes near train stations.

Click here for Plaintalker’s previous post on the proposed ordinance.

At the Aug. 11 meeting, Councilman Rashid Burney also called for more community input into the design of any project in the zone. In public comment, resident Chris Rutherford said he was hearing about a “huge 5-story apartment building coming in” and expressed concern about the impact on traffic and schools in the neighborhood.

“I just feel like we’re kind of out of the loop on what’s going on,” he said.

--Bernice Paglia

Council Mulls Transit Village Zone Ordinance

Proposed zoning changes for a portion of South Avenue drew suspicion Monday that they were geared to a developer in the wings.

The TOD-N ordinance would affect the north side of the street only, between McDonald’s to the east and Central Street to the west. The zone is within a quarter mile of the Netherwood train station and reflects tenets of transit-oriented development by allowing increased density of 75 units per acre and building heights up to five stories. Rules call for mixed use, commercial at street level and residential above. The parking ratio would be one space for each unit and one bike rack space as well.

Although no applications are on file, there has been talk for weeks of an Ohio firm being interested in the G.O. Keller property at South and Leland avenues. Omnipointe has sought a conceptual hearing by the Planning Board of its plans. Click here to learn more about Omnipointe.

On Monday, the council was asked to decide whether studio apartments should be included. Council members had no objections, but preferred ownership of residential units to rentals. Planning Director William Nierstedt also brought up a new issue, a Supreme Court decision that came down just last week regarding open space. The new zoning would allow a developer to pay for open space somewhere else in the city in lieu of providing it on site, but the court had ruled against such arrangements, Nierstedt said.

Councilman William Reid, who was appointed in January to replace Councilman Cory Storch as liaison to the Planning Board, assured members that planners had thoroughly examined all aspects of the zoning change. He said the change would create the “first of the transit-oriented districts” and that perhaps people who work in New York would choose to live there.

Storch said the city should not just look at “narrow strips,” but should look also across the street and at North Avenue. He said having the zoning changed before a developer filed plans “strips us of our elbow room” to negotiate terms. Storch called for more community input, saying ”I don’t want to go ahead with this.”

In public comment, Netherwood Neighbors Association President Tony Rucker spoke against the proposed changes.

“When we lower the bar so low they could crawl over it,” he said, there would be no way to say “no” to a developer.

The council agreed to put the ordinance up for a vote on first reading July 21, but it was unclear whether there would be enough votes to pass it. Click here to view or download the ordinance.

--Bernice Paglia

South Avenue Plan Withdrawn, Still Challenged

The ordinance that would have set the stage for a 5-story, 75 unit per acre residential project at Leland and South avenues was withdrawn from the City Council’s agenda Monday (Aug. 18, 2008).

Still, neighborhood protesters vowed to challenge it, saying the proposed parameters were out of line. Speakers said the site should have no more than three stories and should not have triple the current density.

Dubbed TOD-N, the ordinance set bulk use requirements for a portion of the area around the Netherwood train station. It included just the north side of South Avenue around the former G.O. Keller’s dry cleaning site.

“This ordinance will reduce the legal protections the city will have to say ‘no’ to developers,” said Tony Rucker, president of Netherwood Neighbors Association.

Rucker cited concerns over added traffic in the area, among other questions.

Jim Spear, another member of the association, said the group was “adamantly opposed” to the ordinance as written.

Spear said the group will be seeking support from other neighborhood associations to oppose the ordinance.

The next chance for the matter to be heard is in September. The City Council meets again for an agenda session on Sept. 8, with a regular meeting on Sept. 15.

--Bernice Paglia

Economy Slowed 2008 Development

As 2008 began, the city had proposals for hundreds of condos and thousands of square feet of retail space on the books in nearly 20 redevelopment plans. In her state of the city address, Mayor Sharon Robinson-Briggs named three as top priorities: the new senior center/condo complex at 400 East Front Street, the massive mixed use project around the main train station and a 12-condo proposal on the Tepper’s block.

Enter the economic downturn that worsened to a collapse.

The senior center/condo project, dubbed “The Monarch,” would miss its third stated deadline for completion, the mayor told seniors in July. Communications with the developer, Dornoch Holdings, became spotty even as city Construction Official Joseph Minarovich said the developer still has until October 2009 to meet terms of an agreement worked out by the city and the Union County Improvement Authority.

The $15 million tab for The Monarch, which features 63 condos over the senior center, is being borne privately by Dornoch, so the company did not go through the state redevelopment process. The other two proposals did go through all the steps, which include finding an area in need of redevelopment, making a redevelopment plan and naming a developer.

Frank Cretella’s Landmark Development Corp. of Jersey City is the designated developer for the North Avenue project. The block between Park and Watchung avenues was the city’s original commercial district and is so recognized in a historic district designation. Buildings there go back to the 1880s. Cretella envisioned creating taller new buildings behind the classic facades to accommodate 415 new residential units and 13,000 square feet of commercial space, including an entertainment center that could draw audiences by train from around the metropolitan region.

An expansion of the redevelopment area was proposed in 2008 to include the PNC Bank block. While no movement has been announced on the main project, Cretella recently unveiled a plan to refurbish the PNC building and two more to the south on Park Avenue. In addition, Cretella moved outside the original redevelopment borders to seek city approval for a commercial project on the Tepper’s block that would include the Appliance-A-Rama warehouse and two vacant city-owned blocks.

Heartstone Development received city approval for the 12-condo project on West Front Street, on two city-owned blocks. But after the city cleared the land, a sign was placed on the site declaring it a “pocket park” with amenities provided by Lucent volunteers.

Presto change-o! The site most recently became part of Cretella’s newly-announced commercial West Front Street plan.

By coincidence, all three of these developers had other projects in Rahway, where Plainfield’s director of Public Works and Urban Development, Jennifer Wenson Maier, is also a councilwoman. According to the Rahway Rising blog, Landmark acquired Main Street properties, including one owned by Wenson Maier and her husband, but has deferred development for the time being. Heartstone asked permission to convert a condo project there to rental units. Dornoch, as reported in Rahway Rising, closed offices it had in Rahway and is not responding to officials there on progress at a condo project, “The Savoy.”

So far, no one has questioned the propriety of having a Rahway legislator dealing with the same developers that she is dealing with in Plainfield as an administrator.

City Council action on redevelopment in 2008 included releasing developer George Capodagli from an agreement to build 352 residential units in five residential structures at East Third and Richmond streets. The 268 one-bedroom and 84 two-bedroom units were to have been built on four floors above 700 ground-level parking spaces. After being released from the agreement in June, Capodagli proposed a four-story, 33-unit residential building on South Avenue, but the Planning Board denied the plan.

Perhaps the most controversial proposal of the year never got past the conceptual stage. An Ohio developer, Omni Pointe, floated the idea of a 5-story structure with 224 units and 30,000 square feet of retail space on the former G.O. Keller site at Leland and South avenues. But residents and officials became concerned when the City Council was asked to approve an ordinance that changed zoning on just the north side of South Avenue where the development might go. The TOD-N ordinance would have allowed increased height and density on the site near the Netherwood train station, based on principles of transit-oriented development. Due to the outcry, the ordinance is in limbo.

Overall, redevelopment in 2008 appeared to be stalled in Plainfield, as in many other cities, due to the failing real estate market and more recently by the global economic collapse. At another time, Plaintalker will offer an update on the entire list of redevelopment projects that were last officially reviewed in September 2007.

--Bernice Paglia

Capodagli Proposes New Project

A developer who was recently released from an agreement to build a 352-unit project at East Third and Richmond streets is now proposing a 33-unit building on South Avenue.

An application on file in the Planning Division names George Capodagli as the sole owner of Plainfield South LLC, the company that is seeking Zoning Board approvals for a four-story building at 1400-06 South Avenue. The proposal exceeds density and height allowances and is not a permitted use in the “neighborhood commercial” zone. The building would replace a one-family dwelling on one of two lots at the site, which is south of the Plainwood Square park across from the Drug Fair. South Avenue splits around the small park.

Plans call for a four-story building with a parking garage on the ground floor. Although 66 single parking spaces are required, the developer proposes 21 single-space parking stalls along with 21 “tandem” spaces in which one car would be parked behind another.

The proposed building site is half a mile from the Netherwood train station.

According to a legal notice by Weiner Lesniak, the applicant’s attorneys, the developer expects to be heard at the Aug. 6 Zoning Board meeting. The board meets at 7 p.m. in City Hall Library. Anyone who is interested can look at the plans and documents in the Planning office on the second floor of City Hall.

The East Third & Richmond proposal was the subject of a flurry of action in 2006, including an “emergency” Planning Board meeting on a Saturday in September to push through an “in need of redevelopment” study. A couple of weeks later, the board approved a redevelopment plan. Capodagli received conditional designation as the developer on Dec. 6, 2006.

Despite at least two extensions of the conditional designation, the developer and the Union County Improvement Authority, which is in charge of the city’s development activities, could not agree on terms of an agreement. The City Council agreed last month to let Capodagli withdraw.

Developers have eyed sections of South Avenue ever since Mayor Sharon Robinson-Briggs began promoting transit-oriented development in early 2006. A condo project on the site of Carfaro’s Auto Body failed to win Zoning Board approval. A proposed study of more than 90 properties around the train station was scaled back to 15 sites. A plan to redevelop two industrial buildings on South Avenue was floated, but no action ensued.

Recently, an ordinance to change the zoning of a site at Leland and South Avenue was withdrawn before council action. The proposed ordinance drew criticism for appearing to set the stage for a developer that has offered a conceptual plan for apartments and stores on the G.O. Keller site.

--Bernice Paglia