Essex cities banking on transit village concept
The first railcars to cross the Oranges to Newark were pulled by horses.
That's how old the modern "transit village" idea is.
So the recent development of housing and businesses around the train stations in urban Essex County, in concept, is nothing new. It's just an extension of a 180-year history of development, decay and redevelopment.
"Now that the New York economy is booming again, the people in all these towns have access to good jobs," said Tom Schulze, coordinator of the Urban Essex Coalition for Smart Growth. "There is great potential for new development."
There are two new residential buildings near the Orange Station, with 24 market-rate condos and 117 subsidized "workforce" apartments.
The F. Berg Hat factory, with 32 condos and commercial loft space for artists, is near completion a half-block from the Highland Avenue Station, also in Orange.
A new building with 128 apartments, on the former Monroe Calculating Machine Co. near the Highland Avenue Station, is about to break ground.
Like the visionaries from 1835 who formed the Morris & Essex train line, the members of the modern Essex smart growth coalition understand the value of proximity to the railroad.
What is new is the emphasis on regional planning and using the arts to gel communities.
The architectural foundation is already there. Those 19th-century brick factories and buildings were built to last, with exteriors that have held up through cycles of neglect and repair.
The housing stock, for the most part, has been equally durable. The building boom in the 1920s brought more luxury apartment buildings and millionaires' estates to the Oranges. Most are still standing.
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In those days, Essex was one of the richest counties in the world and attracted the country's best architects. Stanford White designed the Orange Library. Frederick Law Olmstead's firm was responsible for Newark and Orange parks. Cass Gilbert drew up the plans for the Essex County Courthouse. Wilson Eyre shaped the home in the Tremont section of Orange where Troy Simmons lives today. Architecturally, Essex County is a study of the masters.
"There are many homes of that type of quality," said Simmons, an architect and member of the Orange Historic Commission. "When people come through here, they're surprised by what they see. There are people here who can afford to live anywhere, but chose to buy these historic homes."
The early 20th-century wealth is apparent in the Seven Oaks and Tremont sections of Orange, the Montrose section in South Orange and the parts of East Orange that border both. Downtown East Orange was known as "Little 5thAvenue," because of B. Altman, R.H. Muir and other high-end department stores.
And they all came because of the railroad.
So did other businesses: the insurance companies and law firms, the metal arts companies, the tanning and leather processing plants, the early electronics makers, and the business machine and hat factories.
The Urban Essex Coalition knows those days aren't returning, but the area is rebounding from the urban blight-decades of the last century.
Schulze is paid by the Greater Newark Local Initiatives Support Coalition, a major partner in Urban Essex Group, and works in the Orange office of the Housing and Neighborhood Development Services (HANDS), another major partner, which has been in the urban redevelopment business for 25 years.
"People are turning back toward these towns," he said.
One piece of evidence is NJ Transit ridership. While overall ridership grew 8 percent, over the last year, four of the five train stations the Urban Essex coalition has taken under its umbrella reflect double-digit increases.
The Broad Street station in Newark showed a 10 percent increase, East Orange spiked 24 percent, Brick Church (also in East Orange) jumped 12 percent and the Orange Station ridership grew 11 percent. Only Highland Avenue (also in Orange) remained flat.
READ: The Urban Essex Smart Growth agenda
"We know new investment is coming," said Pat Morrissy, executive director of HANDS. "These communities have assets that have gone ignored. Now, they're fighting back against the forces (that caused the downturn) to create stronger communities that work for everybody."
HANDS is refurbishing the F. Berg hat factory in Orange's Valley Arts district, one of several major projects for market-rate and affordable housing, and retail shops in the region, with more to come. Newark's Westinghouse site, for example, is cleared just feet from the Broad Street Station.
"We know development is going to happen," Morrissy said. "We also know areas that work best are planned. We shouldn't be developing without thought to the public realm."
On the coalition agenda is a study of the impact of Route 280 on the area, and how to undo its community-splitting effect. The interstate cuts Orange and East Orange right down the middle, through the heart of the downtowns. Worse, it runs parallel with the rail line, creating a barrier to the transit village idea, clearly without thought to "the public realm."
"When the highway opened, there wasn't even an exit for Orange," said Candace Gabbard, the executive director of Valley Arts, Inc., a nonprofit organization that has fueled the recent craft and artisan movement in Orange.
Gabbard's group is part of the coalition and is studying ways to create a more hospitable community environment along Freeway Drive, the wide and pedestrian-hostile Route 280 access road that looks more like Daytona than a friendly city street.
On Thursday night, Orange Mayor Dwayne Warren held an information session about new residential development and the restoration of the Highland Avenue train station.
"Younger people are marching back to the cities and we're well-positioned to be a transit hub because we have the resources," he said. "We have a housing stock that can bring in families. We have million dollar homes and we have working class housing."
At the meeting Andrew Davlouros, of HANDS, talked about the hat factory development and Joseph Alpert presented a plan for the 128 apartments and a parking deck on the site of the old Monroe building.
Alpert talked about the push-and-pull of getting more NJ Transit "Midtown Direct" service to the urban stations.
"They (NJ Transit) say, 'Show us more riders and we'll give you more service,' " Alpert said. "I say, 'Give us more service and we'll show you more riders.' "
But the way things look now, those riders are coming, just like they did 180 years ago.
Mark Di Ionno may be reached at mdiionno@starledger.com. Follow The Star-Ledger on Twitter @StarLedger and find us on Facebook.