While the three finalists for planner of the West Windsor redevelopment have been asked not to speak with the press until after their initial presentations are made, one former planner for the project has no problem sharing his views. Jerry Ford won’t be making a public presentation later this month. He was ruled out as planner for the project months ago. Mayor Shing-Fu Hsueh says he’d like to hear more from Ford as the planning process progresses.
Ford, of Ford 3 Architects, was involved with a group of landowners and stakeholders that presented a redevelopment plan to the township nearly a year ago. The group, Junction Area Works, (JAWS) proposed a plan to redevelop the 350-acre area in need of redevelopment at no cost to West Windsor residents.
“What we would have brought to the process was that the business owners, whose interests are broader than those involved in a political process, would have paid for it and there would be no absence of a sufficient review process,” says Ford, whose practice is based on Nassau Street in Princeton.
Ford first spoke to the planning board on behalf of JAWS on November 2, 2005. He presented a letter outlining the group’s ideas. “Our cooperation is based on the premise that the property owners generate, at their own expense, the master plan for the development of the Transit Village,” read the letter.
The group’s proposal led to a meeting with township administrators on February 13. In addition to Ford, the meeting was attended by Aubrey Haines of Mercer Oak Realty, Robin L. Murray of RLM Architects, Walter Schmidlin of Sarnoff, Philip Donovan and J. Robert Hillier of Hillier Architecture, and attorneys Kevin Moore, Elizabeth Donahue, and Mark Solomon.
Hsueh says this was the first of three meetings he has held with area landowners. “I will be more than happy to see them come together and come forward as an organized group and be involved. I encouraged them to invite me to attend more meetings. At that point they didn’t have anything really concrete. I would like for them to be involved. When we have a planning consultant, they will be required to have open public meetings. The public’s involvement will be a very important part of the whole process, and I will do what I can to accommodate everyone who wants to be a part of it.”
The JAWS proposal requested that the stakeholders involved in the project get tax benefits for their participation. “Ultimately what we propose will be of great tax benefit to West Windsor but there will probably be times when the individual property owners will suffer gaps in rental income due to construction. We will look for some form of tax relief at these times.”
The November, 2005, letter also explained that J. Robert Hillier, one-time member of JAWS and principal for Hillier Architecture, “pointed out that the present plan is not ambitious enough. We agree because we calculate that the present plan lacks sufficient density to fund the parking lots and other amenities. We ask the Planning Board and Township Committee to refrain from proposing unrealistic economic constraints such as low density and building massing.”
The proposal in question had been made by Ehrenkrantz, Eckstut & Kuhn Architects. The consultant for the project was Eric Fang, who currently is working for Street-Works, another one of the finalists. According to Ford, Bob Hillier said at a Princeton Chamber discussion on Transit Villages last October that the Ehrenkrantz project was “not ambitious enough.”
When it was made clear that the township would be undertaking the selection process for a planner, Hillier Architects broke off from JAWS and submitted a proposal on its own, according to Ford. It is now competing against Street-Works and Michael Graves and Associates of Princeton to be selected as the project’s planner.
Though the township decided not to accept the JAWS proposal, many elements of their suggestions are present in the proposals which became the eventual finalists.
Reads the November letter: “Since many of the property owners are landlords who must coordinate rental agreements with a realistic development schedule, we expect to enter into an agreement with the Township with a guaranteed time component.” Each of the three finalists’ proposals highlights the firm’s ability to provide services in a timely fashion.
“Construction needs to be scheduled in such a way that there is minimum disruption to the commuters as they enter, park, and exit the lots,” the proposal explains. Each finalist has also stressed the importance of development done in phases.
Says Ford: “I’m impressed with the mayor and all his efforts to get this project moving. It’s very much needed. My only disagreement is with the process.”
Ford says he believes it is a problem that the current process allows local land and business owners no way to make progress in the meantime in anticipation of the plan for the redevelopment. “The owners are hamstrung,” says Ford.
Ford said the most important thing to consider in the redevelopment is the ease with which people will be able to get to and from the train station.
Ford says he would like to see JAWS surface again as an organization with an interest in the direction the redevelopment takes. Members of JAWS say the group has not had regular meetings since February, but all who commented said they are interested in continuing to help the group be a factor in plans for the redevelopment.
