Downtown Camden redevelopment push expected to move forward soon

CAMDEN — A multi-year effort to upgrade the area around the city's transit center is approaching a milestone.

With another on the horizon.

The Camden County Improvement Authority is awaiting proposals from prospective master developers for its Walter Rand Transportation District.

The eventual choice will "establish and execute" the area's transformation “into a modern mixed-use transportation hub," says the CCIA.

The square-block district is anchored by the Walter Rand Transportation Center, a dreary complex built in 1989 at Broadway and Martin Luther King Jr. Boulevard.

It's also bound by Haddon Avenue and Federal Street, and includes an office building, a McDonald's, a vacant Rite Aid and a few shops described by the CCIA as "lower quality."

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The request for proposals also notes Cooper University Health Care — described as "a primary driver" for the redevelopment effort — will soon launch a $2 billion expansion of its nearby medical campus.

Cooper is to break ground this fall for a 10-story, 330,000-square-foot patient tower next to its hospital at Haddon Avenue and Martin Luther King Jr. Boulevard.

That project will be followed by "demolition and construction to upgrade other areas of the hospital campus," Cooper said in requesting approval for the tower from Camden's zoning board.

And the CCIA notes Cooper has agreed to include its 101 Haddon Avenue office building in the redevelopment area.

That would allow “wholesale replacement” of the five-story, 102,000-square-foot structure, “with new facilities to be incorporated into the overall development plan,” the CCIA document says.

In a statement, Cooper said it "has long supported the revitalization efforts of the city of Camden and is embarking on a major expansion of its health sciences campus to meet its growth."

Cooper's new tower, with at least 125 beds, would occupy a roughly eight-acre landscaped site that once held a parking garage.

That project will be followed by "future demolition and construction to upgrade other areas of the hospital campus,” according to Cooper’s application before Camden’s zoning board.

The board approved the project in April.

Once the tower is built, Cooper will move activities from “older areas” of its existing hospital, which the application describes as “aging.”

The health system plans eventually to add three buildings, while renovating a fourth, according to the CCIA's document.

Cooper's pending expansion is unrelated to a 2014 project that's cited in a recent racketeering indictment against the nonprofit's chairman, George E. Norcross III, and other defendants.

Among other claims, the state indictment alleges improprieties by Norcross and others in Cooper's acquisition of about $40 million in state tax breaks tied to the purchase of a downtown office center, the L3 complex at Federal Street and Delaware Avenue.

Norcross and other defendants deny any wrongdoing. The indictment does not name Cooper as a defendant.

Gov. Phil Murphy announced plans in February 2021 to upgrade the transportation center, which is owned by NJ Transit.

The transit agency is overseeing redevelopment of the center itself, which includes an adjacent 450-space parking garage and office space for the agency.

It says the project is in the design phase.

The transportation center is among the busiest places in Camden, but relatively few passengers linger at its bleak setting.

The CCIA reports about 15,000 “passenger movements” on a typical weekday, about half of those on 25 bus lines.

Other passengers travel via the PATCO Hi-Speedline, the River LINE light rail line, and a downtown shuttle bus service.

The CCIA document calls the Rand center "outdated" and notes "safety concerns" and "inefficient" connections between passenger lines.

NJ Transit says its conceptual plan would consolidate bus services inside the new facility, and would provide "community spaces, retail operations and police facilities..."

Long-term plans could see construction of a tower on top of the new transportation center, a pedestrian bridge across MLK Boulevard and the closure of Broadway outside the complex, according to the CCIA..

The revitalized transit center is expected to "do more than just shuttle people from one place to another," said Louis Cappelli Jr., the county's commissioner director.

He said the county is looking at the site "through the lens of kaleidoscope, meaning that we want it to have a variety of different uses and not just focus on one thing."

Similarly, the CCIA asserts the upgraded site will “serve as the anchor for the city’s continued renaissance.”

The developers' proposals are to be opened July 30 for consideration by the authority’s board and consultants. A decision is scheduled for Aug. 27.

"Moving forward," Cappelli said, "the developer will be instituting the vision of the city for the next 50 years and defining this critical piece of infrastructure for our community."

Jim Walsh is a senior reporter with the Courier-Post, Burlington County Times and The Daily Journal. Email: Jwalsh@cpsj.com.

This article originally appeared on Cherry Hill Courier-Post: Cooper expected to have key role in downtown Camden redevelopment