ABERDEEN — Given the amount of time that has passed, the township plans to re-examine the 59.5 acres of land surrounding the Aberdeen train station to determine if the area should remain designated as an area in need of redevelopment.
Members of the Township Council unanimously passed a resolution on Dec. 27 authorizing township planner, Coppola and CoppolaAssociates, to conduct a new study to re-examine the area.
“We just want to make sure the original study conforms to existing laws,” Daniel McCarthy, township attorney said.
Plans for a transit village area date to 1999 whenAberdeen designated a 59.5-acre area surrounding the station as a redevelopment area. Matawan followed suit in July 2000, designating 44.23 acres of land surrounding the Matawan train station for redevelopment.
“A lot of things have changed since 1999,” McCarthy said.
According to McCarthy, the original study in 1999 examined the entire re-development area, including land in Matawan. The new study will only examine land in Aberdeen.
“We asked the planner to look at the original study to determine what needs to be done,” he said. “There is a variety of criteria under the law to determine whether land is in need of redevelopment.”
This is the second step Aberdeen has taken toward making the redevelopment of the train station a reality.
On Aug 16, the council renewed a contract with Silver Oak Properties to develop its portion of the transit village, extending it for another 180 days.
“This is to show Silver Oak that they have our support and we are interested in pursuing this project,” Tagliarini said at that time.
Matawan officials have taken similar steps to move forward with the train station redevelopment.
At the Oct. 4 Matawan Borough Council meeting, borough officials approved an agreement with K Hovnanian Companies and the Columbia Group as the developers for the Matawan transit village.
According to Mayor Paul Buccellato, the council also appointed Beacon Planning, Colts Neck, to begin a new study of the area, though no formal authorization has been given yet.
“They were re-evaluating the area years after the initial evaluation, but then the lawsuit occurred, which stalled everything,” Buccellato said.
The Matawan and Aberdeen partnership on the train station redevelopment ended with litigation brought by Silver Oak.
Originally, Aberdeen was designated the lead agency for the project and retained Silver Oak Properties to act as redeveloper.
However, when Matawan hired the Columbia Group as redeveloper, Silver Oak sued the borough.
In January 2003, Silver Oak filed a complaint against Matawan, the Columbia Group and NJ Transit, challenging the designation of the Columbia Group as redeveloper and asking the court to set that aside and designate Silver Oak as the redeveloper for Matawan.
The court granted Matawan’s motion for summary judgment in January 2007 and Silver Oak appealed. The Appellate Division of the New Jersey Supreme Court ruled on July 14, 2008 that Matawan and its council did not act improperly when they designated the Columbia Group as the redeveloper for the train station.
Despite the lawsuit, both municipalities have expressed similar plans to use the area for mixed use with retail or commercial businesses at street level and residential units above.