Three developers are interested in the Town Center redevelopment plan and have approached the city about doing the project in phases, City Administrator and Redevelopment Director Peter Pelissier said at Wednesday night’s Redevelopment Agency meeting.
Monthly Archives: May 2008
Gimme an I-G-O
On our way to check out Saturday’s block party on East Cherry Street, my eagle-eyed girlfriend Kathleen spotted some lettering near the roof of the Hotel Indigo at Sky View. There was no sign of the letters Tuesday night on my way to a City Council meeting.
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On Friday night, my friend Vince and I were at Luciano’s for a few drinks. The Alice Project entertained the bar/lounge, which was pretty crowded when we arrived around 9:30 but cleared out by 10:30. The Alice Project has played Luciano’s before but their one-of-a-kind cover of “Video Killed The Radio Star” was unique enough for me to take a chance on their latest album. Their sound reminded me a little of Sheryl Crow or more precisely, (and more obscure), Marry Me Jane. I would definitely check them out next time they’re around.
I’ll be catching up on some posts the rest of this week, so be sure to check back.
Senior housing at St. Mary’s moves forward
City Council introduced an ordinance last month to create a Payment In Lieu of Taxes (PILOT), the first step for a four-story, 50-unit affordable senior housing facility adjacent to St. Mary’s along Esterbrook Avenue, just in from Central Avenue. A public hearing and final adoption of the PILOT is scheduled at the council’s regular meeting on May 12.
Representatives from Domus Corporation, affiliated with Catholic Charities of the Newark Archdiocese, came before the governing body in December with their plan. The existing structure, (photo left), the former convent building, would be demolished and the new facilty would extend slightly into the existing parking lot.
Once City Council approves the PILOT, Catholic Charities will need approval from the Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD), which would finance the project, before even going to the Planning Board. There was some concern among council members after the December presentation about parking and the size of the new structure which is expected to be addressed when the project ultimately comes before the Planning Board.
The 40-year PILOT, which must coincide with the duration of financing, would pay the city 15 percent of net proceeds. The 15-percent figure is fixed but the total sum would increase as rents for individual units increase, said Phil Frese, president and CEO of Domus. Since the property is owned by the Newark Archdiocese it is tax-exempt.
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NJ Transit, which is reporting increased ridership this year, will enact schedule changes May 11 (next Sunday). The new schedule includes adding several weekend trains to the Northeast Corridor line service.
Happy six months everybody
Paper is what you give for a first anniversary. What do you give for a six-month “anniversary”? Ah, you don’t have to get me anything; reading the blog is gift enough for me. Six months technically isn’t an anniversary anyway, which is why I hate when people say x-month/week anniversary. But happy six months to everyone.
Another record number of votes in the the latest poll, besting the last poll, which had 73 votes. Of course anyone with too much time on their hands could skew the results, so it’s by no means scientific — but it sure is fun!
“It’s almost six months since we started. What do you think of the blog?”
Positively blog-irific! I can’t get enough! — (58/76) 76 percent
I like to check in, but I’m not addicted — (15/76) 19 percent
A blog among many — (1/76) 1 percent
Ah, you’re just a shill for the (insert political party here) — (1/76) 1 percent
Don’t quit your day job — (1/76) 1 percent
Wow, thanks for all the love, the checks are in the mail. But seriously, even those who didn’t gush about the blog, I’m always open to suggestions about anything at all. And since the brain trust is running dry lately for new poll questions, feel free to pass along any suggestions. Let ‘er rip in the comments section anytime. And try checking in on comments from older posts, you’d be surprised what you find.
The first couple of months were focused on just getting something posted and it wasn’t until about mid-January that I got around to tracking visits to the blog and jazzing it up, i.e., subscribe by email, etc. I’ll try to experiment some more but I tend to worry about just getting news up.
In case you’re interested, here are some statistics about the blog (gotta love Google Analytics even though they probably have more info on me than I care to think about). Since mid-January, we’ve had 8,569 visits from 2,792 visitors and almost 18,000 page views and with more than 2 page views per visit. We now get more than 100 visits almost every weekday (one reason why I tend to post stuff during the week more often lately), with a high of 181 on March 31. Average time on site is almost 3 minutes and the percentage of new visits is still almost 33 percent.
Of the more than 2,600 visits that found the blog by keyword searches, almost 600 (22 percent) came from searches for “rahway rising,” “rahway blog” and “rahway rising blog.” It appears some people still just type in the name in a search and access the blog that way; bookmark it, baby! Or better yet, subscribe by email or RSS feed. There are 68 subscribers by email, slow and steady growth the past two months (maybe a handful of new ones each week).
Here’s a quick breakdown of the most common keyword searches that ended up visiting the blog:
Luciano’s — 343 visits (13.1 percent, of the 2,600+)
SkyView — 182 (6.9 percent)
Cubanu — 167 (6.4 percent)
Rahway Center Partnership survey — 62 (2.3 percent)
Dornoch — 47 (1.8 percent)
There may have been slightly more in some categories, but I lumped all related searches into one, i.e., Luciano’s had searches for “luciano’s rahway,” “luciano’s restaurant,” etc. Not surprisingly then, the top three most viewed posts in the first six months all were related to Luciano’s and Cubanu opening or reviews. Rounding out the top five were the posts about condos rejected at the Koza’s site (big among nj.com readers ea few months back) and the state of the city address, which mentioned several development projects.
Most readers usually access the site directly, but 4.6 percent came through nj.com, and another 3.8 percent through craigslist (New York and New Jersey).
Thanks to everyone who’s been reading and those who have commented — especially those who don’t do it anonymously — it’s really kicked it up a notch the last few weeks.