Viagra for Plainfield planning?

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Quick, get the LeFrak brothers! No, get some Viagra first! Then the LeFrak brothers.

With development beginning to be much in the air, Plainfield needs a good dose of Viagra -- of the planning type.

Or to study the game of the LeFrak brothers, who have played out a long strategy to turn Jersey City's ugly waterfront into a Gold Coast. Long story short: They had a vision. They developed a plan. They stuck to it. Year after year after year. Oh, did we mention they had resources to do it?

When the Zoning Board has its special meeting tomorrow night, it will take up a proposal for a condo development on South Avenue.

The temptation will be to view the project narrowly, and make a determination whether to grant the required variances on the narrowest of possible grounds. This is, after all, the Board of Adjustment -- its job is to excuse applicants from the strictest interpretation of the zoning requirements if it deems it should.

But SOMEONE has to take a longer view --

• of the area in which the proposal is set and plans for its long-term future
• of the baseline of requirements such as parking, buffer areas, amenities, etc.
• of the economic viability of such proposals if larger issues are not also addressed (rail improvements or express buses, for example)
• of the displacement of non-residential ratepayers, making the tax base even MORE DEPENDENT on the residential portion

And then there are the questions about the developers --

• will they be creative enough to take the Viagra view (build up rather than spread out) and leave some ground to meet zoning requirements?
• do they have the financial muscle to pull projects off as market-rate projects, without going the SUBSIDIZED HOUSING route?
• are they prepared to partner with the community -- as opposed to steamrolling it?
• will they become REAL ratepayers, and not PILOTs (payments in lieu of taxes)?

Tomorrow may be the opening of a long and potentially beneficial phase in Plainfield's future. Or it may not. Whether it will ultimately be beneficial will depend on the quality of the contribution of Plainfield's players -- elected officials, professional staff and the citizen-volunteers who interpret the land-use law and make the judgments about how Plainfield will develop.

In Chinese, the ideogram for OPPORTUNITY and DANGER is one and the same.

Zoning Board Special Meeting
Tomorrow, Wednesday, July 26
7:00 PM
City Hall Library
Topic: South Avenue Condo Proposal

-- Dan Damon

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