Westfield approves redevelopment ordinance for $350 million downtown plan. Now what?

WESTFIELD – After years of "kicking the can down the road," Westfield has taken a big step toward revitalizing its downtown by approving a redevelopment ordinance for the One Westfield Place proposal for the shuttered Lord & Taylor site and train station area.

The ordinance, passed by the Town Council by a 7-1 margin Tuesday night, is not the final approval for the $350 million project, Mayor Shelley Brindle said.

"There is still a long way to go," the mayor said.

The project still must receive site plan approval from the Planning Board where many of the details will be worked out, Brindle said.

Construction may not start until late 2024, she said.

Opponents of the project again urged the Town Council to reduce the scope and scale of the project, concentrating their arguments on traffic and parking issues.

Resident William West said traffic will get worse in the already congested downtown.

He said the development's traffic study is not consistent with the town's master plan and he doubted that workers in the office buildings proposed by the train station will take the train to work.

Resident Ted Ritter said the proposed redevelopment of the Lord & Taylor site is "just too huge" for the neighborhood and will be too close to homes. He called the proposal an "urban monstrosity."

Others criticized the Planning Board’s endorsement of the redevelopment ordinance, saying that board members ignored a document drafted by the Westfield Advocates for Responsible Development, the grassroots group opposing the plan, that listed 30 inconsistencies with the master plan.

Sam Altman, a junior at Westfield High School, told the Council that his fellow students are in favor of the redevelopment because they "want a downtown where they can go shopping all day" instead of going to the Menlo Park Mall. He also said they want "a place to hang out."

Councilman Mark LoGrippo. who cast the only dissenting vote on the redevelopment ordinance, said that while he liked the Lord & Taylor part of the project, he thought the train station portion was "too large, too dense.”

He also said he was worried about adding more traffic to the Central Avenue and Mountain Avenue corridors.

LoGrippo also expressed doubts about approving a 30-year Payment in Lieu of Taxes (PILOT) tax abatement program with a "global conglomerate," Streetworks, the development arm of Hudson Bay Co. which owned the Lord & Taylor property.

PILOTS, he said, "rarely reach their full potential."

Town officials say that the proposed PILOT agreement would generate $210 million in revenue for Westfield, some of which could be used to build a new firehouse and stabilize property taxes.

LoGrippo also said there are "a lot of unknowns" about the project and that the preview center, which opened in September, should be open for another six months before a vote is taken.

But Councilman David Contract said the pros of the project outweigh the cons.

"It's not perfect, but nothing is," he said.

Contract said the town has lost 2,000 jobs and has been seeking a solution to the downtown vacancy problem since 1999.

He said other towns in Central Jersey - Cranford, Princeton, Metuchen and Summit - have gotten a head start over Westfield in downtown revitalization projects.

"No one is complaining about those downtowns," he said.

The mayor said the public has been involved in the four-year process of developing the plan at every stage, but that it's "impossible to govern by committee."

She too said it was not "a perfect project" but the town had to balance the pros and cons.

"It's so much easier to say no, then getting to yes," the mayor said.

The primary goal of the plan, Brindle said, is "the long-term vibrancy of downtown."

She said One Westfield Place will be a "national model for a post-COVID downtown."

The plan for the 7.3-acre Lord & Taylor site calls for the adaptive re-use of the existing building into 100,000 square feet of office space; two residential buildings with 138 age-restricted units, 21 of which will be affordable; 16 townhouses for residents 55 and older; 13,300 square feet of retail space and another residential building at the corner of North Avenue and Clark Street with 28 market-rate units and six affordable units.

To the east of the train station on the North Avenue side of the tracks, the plan calls for a .22-acre section of Parking Lot 8 to have one residential building with 29 market-rate apartments and six affordable loft-style apartments; 2,110 square feet of retail at the corner of North and Central avenues and a public parking garage with 300 spaces.

By the train station on the south side of the tracks, the plan calls for a two-acre portion of Municipal Parking Lot 3 on South Avenue to have two buildings with a 210,000 square feet of office space, 12,000 square feet of retail along South Avenue and the new Boulevard extension and a new public parking garage with 200 spaces.

Email: mdeak@mycentraljersey.com

Mike Deak is a reporter for mycentraljersey.com. To get unlimited access to his articles on Somerset and Hunterdon counties, please subscribe or activate your digital account.

This article originally appeared on MyCentralJersey.com: Westfield approves redevelopment ordinance for Lord & Taylor