redevelopment

DMR-designed Grande at Metropark Welcomes First Residents

DMR-designed Grande at Metropark Welcomes First Residents 789 444 DMR Architects

Residents have starting moving into the first phase of the 355-unit, DMR-designed The Grande at Metropark, and when completed, its units will bring the firm’s portfolio to 3,000 rental and condo units in more than 20 communities in New Jersey.

Developer SAMTD Acquisitions Woodbridge Urban Renewal LLC retained DMR in 2016 for the four-building community of one- and two-bedroom units and two-story loft-style units with mezzanines.  The plans also include 12,000 square feet of ground-floor retail space.

“Woodbridge’s position at the nexus of great shopping, major automotive arteries and public transportation makes it a very appealing place to live, with the number of people wanting to live there outpacing the residential housing options,” said Kurt Vierheilig, AIA, LEED AP BD+C. “The Grande at Metropark expands the number of homes to choose from while offering a modern luxury rental option that was not previously available in this market.”

DMR’s design incorporated luxury amenities including a club room and movie theater for all buildings to use, family dining rooms with warming kitchenettes for party rentals, and fitness centers in each building.  Outdoor spaces throughout the property include a pool, gazebos and outdoor seating areas, as well as a roof top terrace with landscaping, barbeque grills and fire pits.  Pet-friendly options include a dog run and dog washing stations at each of the buildings.

Redevelopment Summit Celebrates Milestones and Sets Vision

Redevelopment Summit Celebrates Milestones and Sets Vision 789 444 DMR Architects

Elected Officials and leaders from the public and private sectors including Hackensack’s Mayor John P. LaBrosse, Jr., Deputy Mayor Kathleen Canestrino and representatives from Hekemian & Company Inc., Russo Development, HornRock Properties, Claremont Companies, Heritage Capital, Waypoint Residential, Lighthouse Living, and DMR Architects celebrated Hackensack’s revitalization accomplishments and set a vision for its future at the recent Hackensack Redevelopment Summit.

At the event, hosted by the City of Hackensack and the Performing Arts Center, developers were invited to continue to fulfill the vision outlined in the City of Hackensack’s Downtown Rehabilitation Plan, which includes improvements to transportation alternatives, parks and open spaces, retail, restaurants and biosciences.

“The success of the City’s revitalization efforts is based on the public and private sector’s ability to work together to create a vibrant mixed-use downtown,” Francis Reiner, PP, LLA stated.  “This was an opportunity for the City, and its partners to set new goals and a vision for the next eight to 10 years.”

The transformation of the City of Hackensack, which began in 2012 with the conversion of an underutilized parking lot into the Atlantic Street Park and the construction of adjacent Performing Arts Center, has advanced to include more than 20 redevelopment plans with more than 3,000 residential units with an estimated half billion dollars of private investments within and surrounding the downtown.

The City continues to implement its visions with the conversion of Main Street back to two way, which is set to be completed by the end of summer 2019.  These improvements will include new streetscape to go along with opening of several mixed-use projects on Main Street.

“The ideas that were set forth at the Summit by the City and the developers will help shape the future for the City,” Reiner stated.

Projects like Heritage Capital’s conversion of the former Bank of America Building, Russo Development‘s redevelopment of the former Record Site, HornRock/Russo’s redevelopment of Lot C adjacent to Foschini Park, as well as Claremont Companies’ and Waypoint Residential‘s projects on Main Street represent the next group of developments that are under construction to offer downtown living within the City.

 

East Brunswick Route 18 Redevelopment

East Brunswick Route 18 Redevelopment Moves Forward

East Brunswick Route 18 Redevelopment Moves Forward 789 444 DMR Architects

The redevelopment of one of New Jersey’s busiest commercial corridors, Route 18 in East Brunswick, is underway, with the latest step forward coming in the form of two RFPs to developers.

Last summer, the East Brunswick Redevelopment Agency retained DMR to develop several redevelopment plans on numerous tracts of land within the Township.

On one of those tracts, 88 acres that includes the Route 18 shopping center and Loehmanns Plaza, DMR developed a redevelopment plan that will bring these lots, all currently under performing or vacant, to life. Despite traffic of more 100,000 cars daily, Route 18 has one of the highest vacancy rates in the State, a challenge that the Township needed to address among other issues including a lack of a downtown center, a growing suburban population and a high volume of commuters who travel to the Township on their way to New York City.

As part of this effort, DMR developed multiple concept plans which called for a town center, including 95,000 SF of retail, 700 units of residential, 62,000 SF of office space, and a parking structure. The plan also includes a hotel, a boulevard and open space.

The RFPs to developers, released last week, are an important step toward implementing needed change.

“We are so excited to welcome a developer to our dedicated team of professionals who are pushing forward our 2020 Vision,” Mayor Brad Cohen said, “Located at the center of the State and close to Rutgers, every major highway and the shore, we are hopeful this project will attract significant interest from the development community.

Past (and future) glory: In real estate, older can be better

Past (and future) glory: In real estate, older can be better 789 444 DMR Architects

by Martin Daks

When folks move into Annin Lofts, a 52-unit edifice at 163 Bloomfield Ave. in Verona, the apartments will have that just-built scent, but the building—an Annin Flag factory for 94 years—is anything but new.

Russo Development and Dinallo Construction Corp. took the nearly century-old structure and updated it for residential use, with move-ins to start this year.

The project is part of a well-established trend: Some 43,000 historic rehabs were completed in the past 40 years, with New Jersey projects representing a $500 million slice of the $90 billion in project outlays, according to a study by Rutgers Edward J. Bloustein School of Planning and Public Policy.

“We were attracted by the potential of the Annin structure,” said Ed Russo, CEO of Russo Development and a member of the joint venture D&R Verona. “When you’re away from the waterfront urban areas, you don’t see many 100-year-old, high-ceiling, concrete buildings. The opportunity of constructing loft-style units in a suburban area made it stand out, and the town was in favor of it.”

When developers rehabilitate an older structure like the former Annin factory, some apply to the National Park Service for an official historic certification and related federal tax credits. Russo and his joint venture partners decided against that.

“We considered that option, but an outside consultant advised against it,” Russo said. “He said it could be done, but it would be more complicated.”

Even without the official designation, the lure of the building was its historic character—and staying true to it meant the project would be challenging in any event

“Even though we gutted the interior, we still had to run electrical lines and mechanical and other distribution systems through concrete floors, which required more than 600 cuts,” Russo said. “It’s not just a matter of cutting through concrete, because preserving the original design meant that in some cases we couldn’t cut through existing floors, and had to reconfigure and coordinate the apartment layouts.”

There were other issues, like remaining true to the window designs. Factories built in the early 1900s tended to have extra-large windows, 20 feet or longer to let in a lot of natural light; they were replaced with energy-efficient ones.

“We had to design the apartment units to work within the confine of the existing windows,” said Kurt Vierheilig, senior project manager, partner and director of design for DMR Architects, which designed the repurposed structure and a new, matching 60-unit building adjacent to it.

“We were able to keep the feel of the older, larger windows,” Vierheilig said. “If this project had been certified as a historical one, we probably would have had to go even further, like matching the thickness of the original [glass partitions].”

Such painstaking planning adds time and costs to the construction process, but it’s all part of building a desirable property, Russo said.

“Of course, it’s got to be in an area that will support the rent, but a historic building is unique and attracts people across demographics,” he said. “Usually the demand for loft-style construction comes from younger people, but here we’re seeing demand from residents who are downsizing but want stay in Verona. There’s not a lot of new product being built here, and Annin Lofts stands out.”

A rich tapestry of history and a high foot traffic were the attractions for Paramount Assets in acquiring Ironbound Plaza in Newark, a triangular-shaped, limestone-clad building at 2 Ferry St.

The property started life around 1905 as a bank and later was converted for medical use. After a redesign, it houses a Blink Fitness—the fitness chain’s first Newark location, opening April 27—and a soon-to-open 7-Eleven convenience store.

“Municipalities like to preserve a city’s character,” said Richard Dunn, senior vice president of Paramount Assets. “Knowing Newark and the history of the Ironbound section was a key to preserving the façade of the structure while returning retail to the area.”

Adjacent to Newark Penn Station, an estimated 30,000 people a day pass by the building.

Paramount Assets wanted to preserve the exterior to maintain the building’s history, “but inside people still want modern facilities,” said Dunn. “The challenge was the greatest on the outside, where any repair and maintenance have to match the era’s look.

“Fortunately, Paramount Assets has done a lot of this kind of adaptive reuse, including Newark properties like Halston Flats at 127 Halsey St., where we engaged in an eco-friendly restoration of a historic industrial building constructed at the turn of the 20th century on the banks of the former Morris Canal. That development now includes 16 luxury apartments and 4,000 square feet of street-level retail.”

Said Blink Vice President of Real Estate Bill Miller: “We recognize that the Ironbound Plaza is a historically significant property. We’re looking forward to preserving the space’s history while also providing a service to the local community.”

Some historic properties are converted from private use to a public one.

Hackensack Performing Arts Center at 102 State St. was part of a strategic plan to revitalize the downtown district into a mixed use, pedestrian-friendly area. The city of Hackensack purchased the 140-year-old old Masonic Temple with the goal of rehabilitating it as cultural and performing arts center.

“The building was constructed as a kind of assembly hall more than century ago, when most of the people would be on the ground floor,” said Francis Reiner, a partner and senior project manager with DMR Architects. “Repurposing the former Masonic building as a theater meant opening up and reinforcing below-ground footings and foundations so they could bear the load of crowds on the second floor.”

The firm’s projects have included the HACPAC and the ongoing rehabilitation of a train station in Bloomfield listed on the National Register of Historic Places.

The HACPAC’s 224-seat theater space has a second-floor stage with access to first-floor dressing rooms through spiral staircases. While maintaining the look and feel of the building, Reiner and his team had to bring it up to modern safety and accessibility standards with new bathrooms, heating and cooling systems, sprinkler systems, ramps, an elevator and other mechanical and other devices.

“It was a challenge,” he said. “But we had the support of the city and the community, and the first performance was on Nov. 11, 2017. Every weekend since then has been booked by community and regional performers and others.”

The Bloomfield train station — at Washington Street and Glenwood Avenue, across the street from a mixed-use development — has its own quirks.

Built in the early 1900s, the property is listed on the National Register of Historic Places. As a result, there are significant restrictions on the restoration, which is still in the planning stage.

“The materials and design for the renovation have to match the original design,” said Reiner. “Fortunately, we found the original architectural drawings, but we had to work with a historic preservation specialist to find matching materials or the best match. For example, the concrete mixture back then used shells, shale, rock and stone.”

But such challenges are worth the effort, he stressed.

“When you’re done, you have an iconic structure,” Reiner said. “They spur activity—new properties have already gone up near the Bloomfield train station—and they enhance an area’s appeal.”

This article originally appeared in NJBiz.

Hackensack: A Redevelopment

Hackensack: A Redevelopment 960 540 DMR Architects

by Francis Reiner, PP, LLA

As densely populated as New Jersey is and as much development as we have seen over the last decade, there remain many once thriving communities struggling to regain relevance. Like many of these proud communities, Hackensack’s fate was sealed back in the 1970’s, with the advent of the malls and proliferation of land use policies that promoted isolated land uses where people would work in one location and live another. Previously esteemed communities like Hackensack slowly died from the inside. Left with little to no residential, high vacancy rates and low rents, these suburban downtown centers become desolate, dangerous areas with little opportunity for revitalization. Even today, there are many communities struggling to create a strategy to recover their vitality without having to compromise their vision and values.

It’s been a long road for Hackensack. Understanding all of the layers, all of the details, all of the pieces that have to be considered from the very start through every decision that is made every day to support the goals, objectives and vision for the City can be daunting. Most people would have given up on the thought that one day Hackensack would have another day in the sun and even with dozens of projects underway, there are still doubters. Even communities who can correctly articulate a strategy that takes into account the complexities of a changing demographic society looking to live and work in ways that no previous generations considered are lost for lack of the most essential element to revitalization: a plan.

But unlike many communities, Hackensack took this first step in redevelopment—which is the hardest to take. A plan may sound simple, and at the beginning it is: create a vision that represents the goals and objectives of the community. Then, identify public initiatives, plans, zoning, projects necessary to encourage the maximum amount of private investments and it quickly becomes more complicated. The plan also needs to maximize private investments in an area with numerous property owners, failing infrastructure, with poor circulation, that lacks parking and provides little to no entertainment without the use of condemnation within an existing and constrained 2% municipal budget. Each decision has to be weighed and measured to understand the financial implications while continuing to seek what is best for both its existing and future residents.

The key is to create a plan that promotes private redevelopment, increases tax revenue and enhances the community in a manner that meets the goals and objectives of the residents that is realistic for both the municipality and for the development community. Too many plans are written that are either not practically realistic or are not financially feasible. This key aspect is one of the most important differences from a plan that sits on a shelf, to a project that gets built. For municipalities, the professionals that represent you and their knowledge of development, costs and construction is a critical component to the creation of a plan.

For Hackensack, this meant creating zoning that encouraged land assemblages by creating a two tiered as of right zoning within the downtown. For small individual properties, a non-catalyst zone was created, which promoted smaller scaled redevelopment with appropriate parking ratios. However, for developers that assembled multiple properties that fronted on Main Street (Min. 200’) a catalyst zone was created, which permitted higher density development with lower parking ratios. For Hackensack’s revitalization this was a key component. Without the use of eminent domain and without any existing large land owners, creating zoning that promoted land assemblage allowed development to move forward. This along with designating a large enough area that allowed developers to find willing sellers without having such a large area that development could feel scattered and unconnected was a crucial first step in creating a vision for the downtown. The result of these strategies was that real estate brokers started to assemble multiple properties and package them for potential developers to consider.

In addition, the implementation of a streamlined submittal, review and approval process through the adoption of a Preliminary Review Committee Process, that gave developers a more certain understanding of the timeline and schedule. Architectural and Streetscape Design Standards were included in the Rehabilitation Plan and every Redevelopment Plan that has since been adopted. These standards represent the architectural design and scale that is consistent with the vision of the community and are the key to getting the look and design of a building during site plan approval.

The final piece was the City’s willingness to consider long term financial incentives to potential developers as a means to move development forward. This tool provides the City with significant increases in revenue that can be invested back into the City in the form of infrastructure improvements and new community facilities. For Hackensack that included the construction of a new public park, the renovation of a 140 year old abandoned building into a state of the art Performing Arts Center, the renovation and expansion of a Community and Recreation Facility, the design of new streetscape, the separation of combined stormwater and sewer system and the conversion Main and State Street back to two way. Fiscal responsibility included hiring an independent financial analyst to review each proposed PILOT.

Hackensack has attracted more than $500 million in private investment in less than 10 years, providing an example for the revitalization ambitions of other communities. Today, there are more that 750 new residential units under construction, with another 750 units that will start construction in 2018 and more than 2,000 additional units planned for in the next 5 to 7 years. The City recently opened a state-of-the-art Performing Arts Center and an award winning downtown park. The conversion of Main Street to two-way traffic is under construction and will include new streetscape and much needed and long overdue infrastructure improvements—all paid for by the revenues generated by redevelopment. The plan put in place only six short years ago is working.

Here’s what Bayonne residents are saying about city’s Master Plan

Here’s what Bayonne residents are saying about city’s Master Plan 960 540 DMR Architects

by Corey W. McDonald

BAYONNE — Rarely does a public meeting in the City Hall’s Council Chambers go without minor squabbles, rising tensions, and even full-blown arguments.

Monday’s gathering at City Hall took on a decidedly different tone.

Several dozen residents attended an open public workshop to discuss the draft of the city’s new Master Plan and give their opinions of future development in the Peninsula City.

After a quick synopsis of the plan’s central suggestions, residents broke up into teams to discuss their opinions on the proposal, as well as specific aspects of the city. They then presented their consensus to the rest of the attendees.

A Master Plan is a legal document adopted by a municipality roughly every 10 years that provides long term goals for development, preservation, transportation, and other aspects of the city’s future.

The workshop was headed by Francis Reiner of DMR Architects, the architectural firm hired by the city to design the plan.

The 175-page document, which is available to read on the city’s website, covers practically every facet of the municipality, but the main focus of the plan is development and where it should be prioritized within the city.

Reiner, who along with his team has been working on the plan for more than a year, summarized the proposal’s suggestion to prioritize development in specific areas called “Station Area Plans” near the city’s light rail stations on Eighth, 22nd, 34th and 45th streets.

“The question is how do you encourage appropriate development (and) how do you protect the existing one- and two-family homes from development occurring right next to them,” Reiner said during the workshop.

He added: “The report really talks about focusing development into a few limited areas in Bayonne and no longer having this kind of piecemeal development… What we’re recommending is that there are clearly identified areas where development should occur in Bayonne… So the goal here is to focus development into those zones that are appropriate so that we can preserve the existing residences and neighborhoods.”

After the presentation, workshop attendees broke up into four groups to discuss the plan and to provide their own suggestions, which Reiner and his team will use for a revised draft that the city will post on its website.

Residents discussed a number of aspects of the Station Area Plans, including suggestions on the size of the development zones.

Peter Franco, a resident of the city who was speaking on behalf on one of the groups, said they wanted to reduce the targeted areas of development from one-quarter mile radii surrounding the stations to one-tenth mile radii.

Franco also suggested consolidating Broadway’s shopping district: “If you look at Chicago, they have a mile-long shopping district and they have a lot of people in Chicago; we have a three-mile long shopping district and we have (roughly) 70,000 people, so realistically its just not sustainable. Consolidating that would make sense.”

There were also suggestions regarding the plan’s proposed rubber trolley that would serve to transport pedestrians east and west from the train stations to Avenue A in order to alleviate parking congestion in the city.

“I think everybody recognized the need for the east-west connection but nobody was particularly approving (in our group) of the trolley plan in its current incarnation,” said Laura Wildes, a resident representing one of the groups.

Other groups, however, said the trolley would provide the city with an “old-fashioned” feel.

Groups were also largely in consensus that the plan’s height recommendation for new development projects—eight to 10 stories—was too high, and five to six stories was about right.

Development wasn’t the only aspect on residents’ minds: participants discussed abandoned religious sites in the city, the need for an assisted living facility for seniors, the longevity of PILOTs given to developers, etc.

But all of the groups pointed to the completion of the Hudson River Walkway and the Hackensack River Walkway, as priorities for the city.

The Hudson River Walkway—which in theory would extend from the George Washington Bridge down to First Street of Bayonne—is incomplete largely due to the old industrial sites on Bayonne’s eastern waterfront. But the Hackensack River Waterfront has potential to be completed with no interference. Resident even suggested establishing commerce on the city’s western walkway.

“What we may not get on the east side, we can certainly get on the west side and I think it would be appealing for the community to have,” Franco said.

After writing a revised draft, Reiner and DMR Architects will present it to the city’s planning board and city council to vote.

Reiner said the firm would like to have a final plan for approval by the council by the end of the summer.

This article originally appeared on NJ.com.

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