J&J developer takes ownership of property
BY JENNIFER AMATO
Staff Writer

FILEPHOTO The 212-acre Johnson & Johnson property on Route 1 has officially been transferred to North Brunswick TOD Associates, which is looking to redevelop the site for a more suitable use.

NORTH BRUNSWICK - The 212-acre former Johnson & Johnson property on Route 1 has finally been acquired by North Brunswick TOD Associates LLC.

The terms of the sale, which were finalized in June, were not disclosed.

Lee & Klatskin Associates will now release the 1.2 million square feet of warehouse, office and laboratory buildings in the short term, according to a press release from TOD Associates. The site can be subdivided into distribution, warehouse and light industrial spaces ranging from 30,000 square feet to 900,000 square feet, and the 60,000 square feet of office and laboratory space can be subdivided into parcels as small as 5,000 square feet.

"We have already seen tremendous interest in this property by both long- and short-term tenants," Chuck Fern of Lee & Klatskin said.

The settlement holds major long-term impact for the township of North Brunswick, which is currently in the midst of discussions on how to redevelop the site.

"So far, North Brunswick TOD Associates has acted very responsibly and certainly in the way you would hope someone acquiring a major, important piece of property in your town would act," Mayor Francis "Mac" Womack said. "As far as I can tell, they have done everything responsibly, and that is a very good omen for the future."

Several public workshops have been held since the beginning of the year to receive resident input concerning which components they wish to see on the site. With railroad tracks crossing the property, a transit village has been proposed as the main focus of redevelopment. Other concepts mentioned by residents include affordable housing units, a hotel and conference center, restaurants, commuter parking, a youth center, a new township library, an amphitheater, retail shops, a new senior center, possibly a new school, and an abundance of open space.

As of the last public workshop held in the spring, three preliminary design layouts were presented by Hillier Architecture of Princeton.

"While only preliminary at this point, the redevelopment plan of this industrial property incorporates many of New Jersey's smart growth principles," said John Taikina, the director of planning and development for TOD Associates.

This smart-growth concept is especially important to the municipality, according to Womack, in formulating North Brunswick as a leading town in the community. The concept refers to incorporating mixed uses in a single area to reduce vehicle dependency, suburban sprawl and traffic congestion, which have increased over the past 50 years because of the common separation of residential and commercial sites by developers.

"What we do with this property is not a question of how we take a piece of property and build on it, it is about North Brunswick becoming a model of smart growth as the state and planning professionals believe areas in New Jersey should [be]," the mayor said. "As North Brunswick finds itself in a situation where we have the Amtrak main line and we have a vast, beautiful piece of property, there's almost a blank slate upon which can be drawn a model of environmentally responsible smart growth, and we have a developer who has so far shown interest in working with the township. I think this is a very, very exciting position for us to make sure North Brunswick in the next decade and on through the rest of the century is a leading model in the state."

North Brunswick TOD Associates is an affiliate of Garden Homes and Garden Commercial Properties, based in Kendall Park.

No further meeting workshops have been scheduled at this time. Visit www.OurTownCenter.info for more information and updated workshop schedules.