ECONOMIC GROWTH SPARKS URBAN RENAISSANCE

摘要

Developer: Advance Realty The scope: Eighty acres of brownfield redevelopment across the Passaic River from Newark, a 20-minute PATH train ride from New York City. The waterfront site is slated to include retailing, offices, residential, hospitality, and park projects. The story: Previously known as the MetroCentre, this former industrial zone consists of remediated land once used for steel-pipe manufacturing. Riverbend is part of a larger Waterfront Redevelopment Project: a plan to revitalize 250 acres, or about a third of the city. Progress has been slowed by the recession, by delayed expansion of the PATH station (now under way), by Superstorm Sandy, and by a tax battle between Harrison and the New York Red Bulls soccer team, which occupies an arena that opened adjacent to Riverbend in 2010. Much of the dust has now settled, and mixed-use projects are moving once again. Advance just completed a 48,500-sf build-to-suit tech center for Panasonic Corp. of North America in Riverbend's "North Pad" section, consisting of engineering offices, lab space, and testing facilities.