ROBBINSVILLE: Housing ‘error’ made in redevelopment plan

Council: Town Center South Redevelopment Plan will be changed

By Joanne Degnan, Managing Editor
   ROBBINSVILLE — The Township Council said last week that the 164-page redevelopment plan for Town Center South needs a “substantive change” — the removal of detached single-family homes as permitted uses in the southern tract.
   The redevelopment plan crafted by planners and attorneys hired by the township, which is by law the redevelopment agency for the project, now will need a second review by the Planning Board, presumably at the board’s Feb. 15 meeting.
   ”There was something that in the initial plan was supposed to be removed, and it was not, in error,” Councilwoman Sheree McGowan, a member of the Township Council’s redevelopment subcommittee, said at the council’s Jan. 26 meeting.
   It was “not the intent to allow for any single-family detached — it’s only suppose to allow for coach homes and town homes,” Ms. McGowan said.
   Single-family detached homes with yards are thought to be more likely to appeal to larger families with children than a housing development with attached residential units, such as townhouses and coach homes.
   ”What we have to do is, because it is a substantial change, we have to send this back to the Planning Board,” Ms. McGowan said.
   The redevelopment area covers about 90 acres on the south side of Route 33 across from the existing Town Center development built by Sharbell. The plan calls for four-story buildings mirroring the existing Town Center (with commercial/retail on street level and residential units above) fronting Route 33’s south side. The plan leaves it up to the potential redevelopers to present ideas for the interior street grid and the residential and nonresidential structures that will be built there.
   The Board of Education expressed dismay about the Town Center South Redevelopment Plan at its Jan. 24 meeting because more residential housing could bring an influx of schoolchildren to a district that has no classroom space for them. The school board is contemplating a December referendum seeking voter approval of a new school or the expansion of the existing elementary and middle schools.
   During the Planning Board’s first review of the redevelopment plan Jan. 18, several board members also took issue with the residential component of the plan, asking why it did not establish minimum residential densities for the southern tract.
   The town’s redevelopment planner, Stuart Wiser, said at the time that the plan needed flexibility in order to attract private redevelopers in a tough economic time. However, he also assured the Planning Board the town would not accept any specific redevelopment proposal that did not meet the overall goal of a mix of commercial and residential uses. All plans offered by redevelopers will be vetted by the redevelopment subcommittee and subject to Township Council approval, he said.
   Planning Board members also asked Mr. Wiser what the plan’s references to “age-targeted” housing meant. Mr. Wiser said age-targeted housing is attractive to young professionals and older “empty-nester” couples because this type of development lacks the tot lots, bike paths and other amenities that are important to parents with young kids. Age-targeted housing, however, is not the same as age-restricted housing, which only can be sold to people who are at least 55 or older.
   The Planning Board voted Jan. 18 to accept the plan and pass it on to the Township Council for final adoption. However, it also made nine recommendations for improvement, including the suggestion a member of the Planning Board be added to the Township Council’s redevelopment subcommittee.
   The redevelopment plan, along with the Planning Board’s recommendations, had been listed on the Jan. 26 Township Council agenda as a discussion item, but Ms. McGowan said that review now is postponed until Feb. 9. Ms. McGowan said there were not enough council members present Jan. 26 to hold the discussion.
   Councilman Ron Witt and Ms. McGowan, who presided over the proceedings in the absence of council President Chris Ciaccio, were the only two members of the governing body physically present Jan. 26. The council had a quorum to conduct other business because Councilman Vince Calcagno voted on all agenda items via telephone conference call from Paris where he was on business, and Councilman Rich Levesque, who was also on a business trip, voted via phone from Washington, D.C., on one budget transfer item that by law needed four affirmative votes to pass.
   Ms. McGowan asked Township Attorney Mark Roselli to prepare a resolution for the Feb. 9 council meeting so the redevelopment plan officially could be sent back to the Planning Board to review the change pertaining to single-family homes. Once the Planning Board acts, the redevelopment ordinance should be ready for introduction at the Township Council’s Feb. 23 meeting, Ms. McGowan said.