A revised concept plan for the Bridgeview project envisions about 300 units across the river from downtown while bifurcating the block to create a new public street, similar to what was done with two other downtown developments.

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Joel Schwartz, principal of Townscape Design and part of Tesla Development with Principal Mark Fauci, presented the revised concept to the Redevelopment Agency during its Nov. 18 meeting, held via Zoom. After about a 15-minute presentation and no questions from commissioners, the Redevelopment Agency approved a resolution (27-20) authorizing the extension of the conditional redeveloper designation for Tesla until May 1.

The original concept, presented in 2017, proposed 172 units in two buildings but the past couple of years has seen the project team acquire additional properties, Schwartz said, allowing for design changes, as well as securing various DEP permits.

The entire 3.25-acre block is now included in the project and the two buildings will be more like 140 and 160 units, respectively, about 300 in all.  The project includes about 370 parking spaces, of which 250 would be in the ground-floor garage and another 120 on-street parallel parking spaces. The original concept had 104 units in one building and 64 in the other with four residential floors above ground-level parking, lobby, amenities and retail space. The two buildings will take up about 2 of the 3.25 acres, Schwartz said. The green area in the center of the building is an outdoor amenity deck, located on top of a ground-level parking garage. On those decks, the outdoor recreation will be most likely a pool, he said.

Schwartz presented an image of the area from about 50 years ago, with cars along Main Street downtown. While that side of the river has seen lots of changes since, he said the area where Bridgeview is proposed has changed very little. Currently, the properties include single-family homes, an auto repair shop, garage, and PSE&G substation.

In the original concept plan, developers would look to acquire about 1.8 acres, specifically five parcels: Block 322, Lots 4.02 (1697 Bridge St.), 7 (1708 Essex St.), 8 (1684 Essex St.), 10 (56 Clarkson Place) and 11 (1677 Bridge St.). In this new concept plan, all of Block 322 would be acquired and redeveloped: Lots 1, 2, 3, 4.01, and 9. The 11 properties are assessed for a total $1.633,500 for the 2020 tax year, generating property taxes of about $116, Five of the properties are classified as commercial; 4 as residential.

“One of the benefits of expanding the project area is we were able to work on the entire block and make significant improvements to civic infrastructure,” Schwartz said. “Infrastructure sounds boring to people but civic infrastructure that has been focused on the redesign of this are really experiential; qualities that matter to everyone. Namely, a more beautiful, functional city and new public park spaces in the heart of the city.”

All four of the original boundary streets are proposed to see substantial improvements that will improve the frontage feeling of stores and make it better for vehicular and pedestrian travel, with the creation of new streetscapes and street tree planting, Schwartz said.

In the center, a new public street — Tesla Street — would create two “right-sized” blocks out of one really large one with some specific street improvements. For example, Clarkson Place is a one-way street that’s 20 feet wide with no parking at all. It is proposed to turn into a two-way street, 34 feet wide, with parallel parking on both sides. Bridge Street is a one-way street with parking on one side and is 25 feet wide, which would be reconstructed to the same standard as Clarkson Place.

The plan would create three new park spaces: a double row of trees along Monroe Street, another along Clarkson Place, and a triangular park at Essex and Bridge streets. “On the plan, a double row of trees just looks like a bunch of green dots,” Schwartz said. “In reality, it looks like this,” he said, presenting a similar design along Princeton’s Nassau Street.

That space was created 20 years ago as part of the Firestone library expansion, with an alley [pronounced al-ley] in a park bordered by trees in a park. Despite the simplicity of planning a double row of trees with a walkway, Schwartz the concept can create a relatively small, peaceful space adjacent to busy, public streets, that adds to the quality of life.

Clarkson Place would have enough space to create a walkway, which could become the beginning of a more active development of park space along the river, Schwartz said, and maybe the beginning of Rahway’s riverwalk.

“The magic of a place like this is you can feel serene and peaceful, immediately adjacent to the busiest street in town,” Schwartz said. In Princeton, the alley is immediately adjacent to Nassau Street, otherwise known as State Highway 27, with 25,000 cars passing daily.

One of the things Rahway could benefit from is having more spaces of this caliber and quality, according to Schwartz. Modest though they are, visually, they’re very prominent,” he said. “You would not be able to drive through Rahway without seeing spaces like this.”

Schwartz said he’s been able to do similar designs twice in Rahway. First, with the 159-unit Park Square, where the project created a new park in the center of the development, and a new street that allowed for every apartment to have a street view while also improving all four boundary streets. Elm Avenue was made safer while Irving Street got 20-foot sidewalks.

At The Mint, a 116-unit project along Monroe Street, the two-acre site was bisected by a new street — extending Monroe Street across Main Street to East Cherry Street. “It’s hard to believe a few years ago, it was just a gravel parking lot in the center of downtown center,” Schwartz said.

It will improve circulation in whole downtown for both pedestrians and vehicles, Schwartz said. He pointed to a similar design employed at Franklin Square along Route 27 in Metuchen in 1999. In the 20 years since it was developed, he said the experience of walking along a state highway — the busiest street in Metuchen — was completely transformed.

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