Big changes are coming to Plainsboro’s Forrestal Village, but the question remains whether a new health club and swimming pool can revitalize the retail and office park.##M:[more]##
“The township has been working with the people at Forrestal Village to enliven and energize the area,” says Ernest Freeman, community development director. “This is really just the beginning of a whole host of activities there.”
The 70,”000-square-foot health and fitness spa will be located in Building C — currently the Market Hall food court — and will offer a full-service athletic component as well as a 5,”510-square-foot addition built for a proposed indoor swimming pool. Other amenities will include massage facilities, sauna, therapeutic machines as well as retail opportunities.
The health and fitness spa is part of Gale Company’s $15 million investment in the revitalization of Forrestal Village. The restaurants currently in Market Hall will be relocated to other area within the center. While the Gale Company, which the Village in 2003, continues to convert much of its space from retail to mixed office use, the Main Street area — from the Westin Hotel to Building C will — will remain largely retail.
No re-zoning was necessary to make way for the health and recreation spa. “The spa was not in a clear sense designated in the range of permitted usages,” says Freeman. “We needed a clarification of what the issues are. There was a range of issues in the earlier plan and it was broadly interpreted as a permitted use.”
It is expected to completed by the end of this year or early in 2006.
