Choi comes out against Edison train station project
Says village center will not happen until housing element is reduced
BY CHRIS GAETANO Staff Writer
Edison Mayor Jun Choi has come out against the Edison Exchange redevelopment project proposed by the firm InterCap Holdings, due to what he sees as an excessive number of residential units in the current plan.

"Thousands of residents offered suggestions and voiced concerns, but they were never incorporated into the landowners' proposal. Many elected representatives, including myself, are firmly opposed to this project as proposed. I believe the residential housing component is too much for our community to absorb," Choi said in an e-mailed statement on June 10.

The mayor went on to say that until the firm reduces the number of residential units, devotes more money to local infrastructure improvements and incorporates more community input, "this project will not happen as it is proposed."

InterCap wasted no time responding, sending a statement to the Sentinel about an hour and a half after Choi released his.

"We believe that with New Jersey's affordable housing regulations in flux, it is important to wait until the new regulations are adopted by the State this fall before revising our plan. Those regulations will constitutionally determine the required number of affordable and marketrate homes that must be built on our site. In the interim, we are actively marketing the existing warehouse space for lease," said Jonathan Jaffe, a spokesperson for the project.

The Edison Exchange project is a proposed redevelopment of 44 acres of land around the Edison train station composed of both commercial and residential elements, as well as significant upgrades and improvements to the train station itself. InterCap CEO and chairman Steve Goldin heavily promoted the project to the public in a series of large community meetings around March of this year. Throughout this process, he emphasized how important community input would be on the overall development of the project, saying it was his desire to build a consensus on what the Edison Exchange would looks like.

The plan will feature a combination of commercial and residential units. About 124,000 square feet will be devoted to shops and restaurants as well as a gym and a day care center. About 250,000 square feet will be devoted to offices. Also included in the plan are a 200-room hotel and an amphitheater in the common area. Also featured will be improvements to the train station itself, such as providing 1,000 parking spaces for commuters, to be held in a large parking deck.

The plan also includes 783 additional residences, of which 555 will be sold at market rate, 188 will be sold as affordable housing units as per state requirements, and 40 as "work-live" units.

Four Edison council members - Ann Marie Griffin-Ussak, Wayne Mascola, Melissa Perilstein and Dr. Sudhanshu Prasad - who ran on a Choi-supported slate last year, issued a joint statement the same day praising the mayor's position.

"Given the opportunity to alter the plans, we believed that InterCap Holdings would do so. They are not willing to change the proposal, and because of that we firmly oppose the project," said the statement, e-mailed to the Sentinel by Perilstein.

In a later phone interview, the councilwoman added that while she does not want to make a generalized statement on housing, she wished to reassure people that she would be very discriminating with regard to housing elements in any redevelopment project.

This thinking is in line with a resolution the council unanimously approved this January that said they would not rezone any property in Edison for residential development unless forced to by some higher authority like the state or federal government. For the InterCap proposal to go forward, the council would need to rezone the area, which is currently set aside for light industrial purposes.

In previous interviews, council members Mascola, Robert Diehl and Antonia Ricigliano all affirmed that they would stick by this resolution when considering the Edison Exchange project specifically.

Ricigliano, a frequent critic of the mayor, laughed heartily after hearing Choi's statement read to her over the phone. She regarded the statement with suspicion, however, and wondered whether his concerns meant that he still supported a housing element to the plan. The councilwoman, among others, has come out against any housing whatsoever.

"I guess he must have heard the people. That's what I figure. He must have heard the people. … My feeling, when he says the residential component is too great, [is that] the people don't want any residential component. Is he proposing if it goes down from, say, 783 to 400, then look what he did for us, and then it might be acceptable? I know that wouldn't be acceptable [to me]," said Ricigliano.

Township spokesman Jerry Barca, when asked what an acceptable level of housing would be, declined to comment due to the hypothetical nature of the question.

"The bottom line is, as proposed, [this project] is not happening … so many people had something to say about this project. They said it, but it's like if a tree is falling in the forest, does anyone hear it? It just seemed like [public input] was unheard," said Barca.

He emphasized that the Edison Exchange is not, nor has it ever been, a township venture and also that there isn't even a formal plan for the development in the township's land-use departments.

Barca, in previous conversations with the Sentinel, had said that there were some concerns over the amount of proposed housing, but this is the first time the mayor has expressed these reservations in public. He said that Choi and Goldin had been engaged in conversations over possible changes to the plan and that the timing of the statement was due to the developer refusing to make any changes.

Since the development's details were first unveiled, a number of residents have been very vocal with their criticisms of the plan, especially its residential component. Detractors have said that the development will overburden the schools and other township services, and so have begun organizing against it. The two chief movers in this effort have been the Edison CommunityAssociation, an activist group that held a large meeting to rally opposition to the project, and the township Board of Education, some members of which have publicly voiced their concerns over the project's impact on the schools. The two have collaborated significantly in their efforts to stop the Edison Exchange project.

InterCap has estimated that the project will produce about 1.5 school-age children for every 100 homes, a figure that is backed by a Rutgers University study as well as their own research. Board members balked at this notion and said that from their estimates, the figure is closer to 1,200 additional students. Board Vice President Joe Romano praised the mayor's decision to come out against the train station.

"I applaud the mayor. I think the mayor is looking in the right direction," said Romano.

Anthony Russomanno, a Zoning Board member and major player in the ECA, was a little more skeptical. He has stated several times that he feels the mayor and Goldin have been working together to push the Edison Exchange project forward, even going so far as to insinuate that Choi's support of the project was a political favor to the developer. Russomanno offered as evidence of his suspicions the mayor's request to New Jersey Transit to halt development on a parking lot at the train station until Goldin could formalize his plans.

When Choi's statement was read to him over the phone, he was initially extremely pleased about this most recent turn of events.

"That's interesting. That's really good. But I think it shows the power of the people … I guess it's a smart move on his part," said Russomanno.

Russomanno called the Sentinel back a few minutes later, though, and expressed some lingering doubts about the statement. He said he was wondering whether this was some kind of trick, pointing out that he has said in the past that Goldin might deliberately put too high a number of residential units in the initial plan so that his real plan will be more palatable when he is ready to play his final hand, and that Choi's statement might be a part of it.

"I kind of predicted the fact that they were going to try to give a high number and then slide back to a small number. This is typical for politicians, to make it look like there's a fight. … It looks like a setup, it looks like a shenanigan, and if that's the case, that's not a win. We're going to go forward with this 'no housing' so they don't play any tricks on us," Russomanno said.