Tag Archives: St. Georges Avenue

Retail/residential project at St. Georges and Plainfield avenues

A two-story retail residential project next to the Quick Chek on St. Georges Avenue is expected to be completed by late spring. Work began early last month.

The project, at the corner of Plainfield Avenue, received Planning Board approval two years ago, but the process to secure state permits and approvals took a year, according to Ralphi Mocci, president and owner of Woodbridge-based Mocci Industries. Acquired for $325,000 in 2003, according to PropertyShark.com, the 0.3553-acre parcel at 446 St. Georges Ave. (Block 16, Lot 1) had been a vacant lot.

The ground floor will include 4,000 square feet of commercial space, which could house anywhere from one to three tenants, Mocci said. The second floor will have four luxury apartments (two, two-bedroom units and two, one-bedroom units), with off-street parking.

Mocci also was involved in the converting the former Huffman-Koos furniture store into the age-restricted, 150-unit Park Terrace Apartments on St. Georges Avenue near Rahway River Park.

Someone’s interested in The Chowder Pot


Someone must be interested in buying The Chowder Pot, the long-closed bar in Lincoln Plaza near the Colonia border.

There were several keyword searches the week before last that led to Rahway Rising, namely, “how can I purchase the retail property of the chowder pot in rahway,” and “chowder pot rahway nj out of business.” Another one of interest was “are there any available liquor license in rahway nj.” Is there nothing Google Analytics can’t do?

I’m told that The Chowder Pot’s liquor license was sold at auction following bankruptcy proceedings but has yet to be transferred.

There also were 14 keyword searches the same week for “Wolff & Samson Carriage City” that eventually found the blog, though not all were new visitors. The trend continued last week with 8 searches, though none were considered “new visitors.” The West Orange-based law firm represents Carriage City Plaza and it’s the third week in a row that a number of keyword searches made it to the blog. One visitor’s keyword search was “problems at Carriage City Plaza.” [Dec. 5 update: I’m told Wolff & Samson no longer represents Carriage City, “after both parties were not pleased with each other’s work.”]

There’s also the keyword searches you wouldn’t expect would find their way to the blog, like “How to wash laundry in the river.” Sorry, can’t help ya there.

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I’m blogging early this week from the West Coast so the posts might arrive at odd times and I’m also catching up on local items. A regular reader already commented on this nj.com story about downtowns in this downturn, but I thought it’d be worth linking to; though it doesn’t mention Rahway, it’s relevant.

Then there’s this report about the St. Georges Apartments selling for $3 million, in which Rahway is mentioned as “very attractive to investors because there is no rent control and it has an impressive downtown redevelopment area taking form as we speak.”

Salon finds another space

A beauty salon that was rebuffed in an attempt to gain space on Irving Street has found a new home on St. Georges Avenue. Heavenly Hair Styles plans a grand opening this month at its new location near West Grand/Westfield avenues.

The Redevelopment Agency last month failed to approve a zoning overlay, by a 3-3-1 vote, that would have exempted the salon from a city ordinance that prohibits personal service businesses within 1,000 feet of each other.

Commissioners are expected to memorialize a resolution on the overlay at their next meeting (Nov. 12), according to Cynthia Solomon, director of community development and secretary to the agency.

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No surprises but here are Rahway’s unofficial election results for anyone interested, which do not include absentee ballots.