Tag Archives: Rahway

Arts District, City Council, Downtown

Council approves Hamilton Street arts projects

4 Comments

With at least one proponent invoking the mythical tale of Prometheus, more than a dozen speakers, including labor union representatives, artists and school officials, last night spoke in favor of borrowing $8.5 million for construction of the Hamilton Street arts projects. Two residents questioned the cost and benefit to city taxpayers.

The City Council last night unanimously approved an $8.5-million bond ordinance to build a 1,100-seat amphitheater (above) at the former Hamilton Laundry site and to renovate the Bell Building (below) to house a black box theater. One speaker after the next noted that the amphitheater project is part of the city’s continuing investment in the Arts District and the overall vision for the arts to drive redevelopment, remaking the city as a destination. (Here’s The Star-Ledger‘s take on last night’s meeting.)

The council last night also unanimously approved ordinances to shift management of the Special Improvement District funds to the Rahway Arts District and to negotiate the purchase of 52 E. Cherry St. from the Rahway Center Partnership.

Construction of the amphitheater is still on schedule to begin this fall, City Engineer James Housten told the Redevelopment Agency last week. Remediation of the soil can begin now that a case manager has been assigned by the state for the city’s Brownfields sites. Most all of the soil has been contaminated with fluids used in dry cleaning, he said, adding that it can either be trucked away or mixed with chemicals on site to remediate.

_uacct = “UA-2976232-1”;
urchinTracker();

Arts District, Downtown, Rahway

‘Eye candy’ planned for downtown areas

Leave a comment

A variety of public art will grace downtown areas as part of the plan to show that Rahway is “All About the Arts.”

In a post-State of the City interview last month and a public presentation before the Redevelopment Agency last week, Mayor James Kennedy talked about murals and sculptures scattered around the downtown loop as part of an overall plan focusing on the arts. He described the visual arts piece as a complement to performing arts initiatives such as the amphitheater and black box theater planned for Hamilton Street and gallery space in the YMCA and Elizabethtown Gas building. The “eye candy,” as the mayor describes it, is expected by mid-summer.

As examples, Kennedy noted the walkway connecting Main Street and the parking lot behind River Place as an ideal spot for a mural or a sculpture, in addition to some areas connecting Hotel Indigo to the Lewis Street parking deck. “The whole arts picture has been growing in many pieces that ultimately is coming together now,” he said.

A committee will determine about two dozen quirky spots downtown for sculptures, which then would be cataloged into a booklet for a sort of sculpture garden. The city would be responsible for the footings but artists would cover the cost of their own sculptures. “The advantage to artists is not that they’re paying for their own sculpture but the advantage is that it gives them exposure and exhibition space,” Kennedy said.

Another program will copy what was done in Ithaca, N.Y., where The Sagan Planet Walk at Sciencenter pays homage to the Rahway native and noted Cornell astronomer. A scale model of the solar system would station planets at specific locations between City Hall and the Arts Guild. The program also would incorporate the high school physics program, the mayor said, while the educational piece would include brass descriptions of the technical data about the size and composition of planets. The sculptures would be to scale so some might be as small as a tennis ball while others might be much larger.

“The neat thing is that it brings a sense of community, it’s a something-to-do kind of thing,” Kennedy said, adding that these initiatives aim to create a pleasant atmosphere but also catch the attention of passersby.

A third aspect of the visual arts piece is a window treatment program like one that was done for the Carriage City Plaza sales office. People looking into the windows can see the image or art while those on the inside can clearly see outside. Rather than have paper covering up vacant storefronts, Kennedy said the city also is trying to encourage empty stores to allow the space for use by artists until they are leased.

_uacct = “UA-2976232-1”;
urchinTracker();

Rahway

County acquires Rahway horse farm

Leave a comment

Did you know there’s a horse farm in Rahway? Well now you do, and now you know it was purchased by Union County through the Open Space, Recreation and Historic Preservation Trust Fund, according to this report.

The 2.54-acre property at Bramhall Road and Jensen Avenue, near the Colonia border, was acquired for $1.7 million. Assessed at almost $560,000, the property paid about $25,000 in taxes last year.

***

I stumbled upon this post on Chowhound looking for some input on Tauros Tapas Grill on Monroe Street. I haven’t been there yet but I know a few readers have, in case anyone wants to share their opinion on that board.

_uacct = “UA-2976232-1”;
urchinTracker();

Commercial, Parking, Planning Board, Rahway, Retail, St Georges Avenue

Board rejects splitting St. Georges Ave. store

3 Comments

The Planning Board Tuesday night unanimously rejected an application to divide a St. Georges Avenue furniture store into three parcels. The application, which originally proposed to split the property into four commercial spaces, was continued from the June meeting when board members had too many questions to vote.

The revised application, though, still had too many questions for Planning Board members, and too many concerns about the impact on parking and traffic in the neighborhood. The rear lot, off Union Street, has about 15 parking spaces, which rarely have more than a handful of cars parked, according to the applicant. The application needs a parking variance since zoning regulations normally would require 32, though it is a pre-existing issue.

The improvements proposed in large part are required anyway, said Planning Board member and City Code Official Richard Watkins, and zoning enforcement could rectify issues with buffers, lighting and signage.

Resident Stefan Williams testified that the application would further aggravate parking problems along the 700 block of Union Street. Parking at the site could increase with additional tenants, but also once business improves, creating more competition for parking along Union Street, he said, which already deals with alternative side parking and a dearth of on-street residential parking.

Williams said there already is an unreasonable amount of traffic on Union Street and the applicant failed to show an exceptional or undue hardship. Board members seemed to agree that a weak economy didn’t justify the relief sought by a variance. Williams testified that the property currently is a viable commercial space and would be better than two vacant spaces, since the property owner testified that he hasn’t yet recruited potential tenants.

“The place is a mess,” said board member William Hering. “I don’t know that this’ll help the site. At the last meeting we said it’s too much on too little, and it still is.”

_uacct = “UA-2976232-1”;
urchinTracker();

Carriage City Plaza, Polls, Rahway

Carriage City Plaza tops 2008 stories

Leave a comment

Blog readers voted overwhelmingly for the opening of Carriage City Plaza and the Hotel Indigo as the biggest redevelopment story of 2008.

Opening of Carriage City Plaza, 54 percent (37/68)
The slow pace of redevelopment, 19 percent (13/68)
The Savoy coming to a halt, 8 percent (6/68)
Reopening of the Union County Arts Center, 8 percent (6/68)
The fast pace of redevelopment, 5 percent (4/68)
Tabulation of the Rahway Survey, 2 percent (2/68)

While most readers pointed to Carriage City, there were almost a third of them who pointed to signs of the slowing economy, like The Savoy coming to a halt and the slow pace of redevelopment. Keep in mind that the survey is far from scientific at all.

The new poll will be up after the Super Bowl. It’s a repeat from last year but we have a few more readers so I thought it’d be interesting to take another look.

“Who makes your favorite pizza in Rahway?”
Brooklyn Pizza
Gino’s
Michelino’s
Nancy’s Townhouse
Papa Vito
Rahway Pizza
Ted’s
Tony’s

_uacct = “UA-2976232-1”;
urchinTracker();

Downtown, Parking, Rahway

Traffic changes this week

Leave a comment

Two-way traffic is scheduled to begin downtown, on Main and Irving streets, this week. In addition to those one-way streets becoming two-way, several one-way side streets (East Cherry and Coach) will reverse direction while another that’s currently two-way (Poplar) will become one-way toward Irving; so all three will flow toward Irving.

Striping is scheduled to be done Monday evening and signs will be uncovered for Tuesday morning when the change is officially expected to occur. If there’s an issue, it could be pushed back a day, said Police Chief John Rodger, but the goal is to have it completed before the holiday weekend.

Cones will run the length of Irving and Main so motorists will have to stay in one lane, reinforcing the pattern change, according to Rodger, and Traffic will have a heavy presence downtown during the transition. The cones will be removed in phases, he added, to continually reinforce the patterns for a period of time.

When merchants were surveyed last year about changing traffic patterns downtown, most were in favor.

_uacct = “UA-2976232-1”;
urchinTracker();

Carriage City Plaza, Downtown, Parking, Rahway

Parking deck permits going up 30 percent

Leave a comment

A 30-percent increase in the monthly cost of parking permits for the Lewis Street garage has sparked a petition drive.

Tina Morgan and others who use the deck are collecting signatures for a petition they plan to present to the Parking Authority. She will be collecting signatures outside the deck on Thursday from 6 to 7:15 p.m., Friday morning, and again from 3 to 5 p.m. that day.

Raising rates had been mentioned as a possibility earlier in the year, but the Parking Authority Board of Commissioners at its June meeting approved increasing the monthly rate for the new parking deck by $20 — from $65 to $85.

Permits for surface lots are going up by $10, roughly 20 percent, from $50 to $60 or $55 to $60. The only fees that won’t see increases are a lot leased from St. Mary’s Church and permits in Lot B (behind The Waiting Room), which are downtown residents and merchants, said Parking Authority Executive Director Don Andersen.

Commissioners, who meet the first Wednesday of the month, discussed fee increases at their May meeting, according to minutes. At least one commissioner suggested Rahway’s rates are “very low” compared to other towns while another said the increases “would not be as bad as originally proposed.” The garage began 24-hour operations June 3 in anticipation of the opening of Carriage City Plaza. Condo residents were expected to begin moving in this month.

Morgan, who uses the deck daily before taking a train to her job in Newark, said the only other neighboring parking deck with comparable rates to Rahway’s $85 is in Elizabeth at $90. She suggested the fee hike be staggered — increasing by $10 this August, and another $10 next August — to make it “more digestible.”

Morgan offered an excerpt of the letter she plans to present to Parking Authority commissioners at their next meeting, Wednesday, July 2 at 6:30 p.m. in the parking deck, 67 Lewis St.:

“We are at the mercy of the Parking Authority since the more reasonably priced surrounding lots have all been removed and no longer available to us. We hope that because the deck is now, for the most part, the ‘only game in town,’ that you would not treat your loyal patrons so cavalierly. We understand $3 million were contributed to the City of Rahway by NJ Transit to allow for the deck to be built. It would seem that NJ Transit’s interest in providing such a grant would be to encourage the public to take mass transit as opposed to overburdening our already heavily congested thoroughfares. We don’t think that the grant was given to eventually price-out the average person who takes the train from Rahway and raise the parking fee to become almost as high as the train fare. This does not seem fair, good business or in the spirit of community, which the Parking Authority heralds on the Web site.”

The $11-million Lewis Street deck opened in December 2004. Of the 524 spaces, 209 are set aside for condo owners at SkyView. Through Tuesday night, Morgan reported 127 signatures on the petition.

_uacct = “UA-2976232-1”;
urchinTracker();

Arts District, Downtown, Rahway, restaurants

Three stars for Luciano’s

Leave a comment

Luciano’s received three stars in a review featured in Friday’s Star-Ledger, and had a few interesting things to say about Rahway as well: “If you haven’t found yourself in Rahway recently, you’ll be surprised by the ever-increasing reasons to go. This is a city on a quest to become a vibrant community, full of urban artists and commuters, with all the energy that entails. It stands to reason, then, that the restaurant scene would enjoy an invigorating renaissance as well.”

Owner Michael Merlis is also quoted: “Merlis expects even more people to re-discover the town and sit at one of the tables that not so recently would have been in a vacant lot. ‘They can’t believe they’re in Rahway.'” Hmm, where have I heard that before?

_uacct = “UA-2976232-1”;
urchinTracker();