Every day hundreds of people from mainly outside Trenton travel through our station. They typically spend as little time in Trenton as possible.

The city is proposing to change that.

It is leveraging a generous state tax incentive to encourage commercial development around urban NJ’s train stations. I have to say, I’m for the tax incentive. The state and federal government have spent $Billions over the year building roads to increase sprawl, it’s good to finally put some balance in the equation.

With the incentive behind it, the city has courted three developers to build three seperate large projects immediately adjacent to the station. I think this is great and can’t see any downside. I even support demolishing the historic-ish building on the north side of Greenwood Ave. to make way for the building.

However,there are two big questions that come to mind as I review the current version of the city’s development plan for the area and come away from tonight’s (6/25) public meeting on the subject.

Tonights Public meeting was rough

First, let me say that while holding public meetings is always a good thing, tonight’s was conducted poorly. The consultant in charge never had control of the meeting, gave a weak presentation and did a terrible job of facilitating. It was as if he’d never run a public meeting. I’m sorry I have to say this, but the meeting did little to instill confidence in the process. And in the Mayor’s own words, public confidence is what is needed to make this project fly.

On to my issues, one is principled and two are economic.

On principle, we as neighbors, should never abuse our power to take property through eminent domain. By abuse, I mean seizing property from an owner of an occupied building who doesn’t want to sell. Even though the Supreme Court (the Kelo decision) has ruled that a city can do this, that doesn’t mean we should. Imagine if it were you. No matter how badly I might want new movie theaters, nice shops and restaurants, modern architecture and grocery stores, taking advantage of a neighbor isn’t worth it.

Councilman Jim Coston’s blog points to this article reflecting on the Kelo Supreme Court decision three years later. (BTW – all Trentonians should be greatful to have a councilman who actually does his homework on city issues.

My second issue is economic. I don’t know if the broader plan to develop the area around the initial three projects will be an economic boon for the city. I don’t know because I haven’t tried to run the numbers nor has the city. This is a large project being proposed by a city administration with a long history of proposing unfeasible projects (Performa, Manex, Leewood, Trenton Town Center, Champale). Before we tangle the neighborhood up in years of master developer hell, we should at least run the numbers and let the press and public vet them. I’ll be glad to help on this.

Finally, the city’s plan, as it currently stands, is overly prescriptive. The plan dictates quite a few aspects of the neighborhood much like the planned communities of the past. Highly planned cities have a questionable reputation. Rather, it seems a smarter idea to take the organic approach and let individual developers build up an area within a broad set of guidelines, rules and incentives. I’d like to know more about why our planners feel the need to be as directive as they are. I’m willing to be proven wrong about this.

There isn’t much I’d like to see more than a new revitalized neighborhood in Trenton. However, neither the consultants nor the city have given me or the public any confidence that the project will have a net benefit to Trenton’s bottom line.

I’m not buying it …. yet.

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I’ve uploaded the city’s current plan for the train station area. It’s dated April 2008 but I don’t believe the plan is final or approved by city council. However, the plan does call for the use of eminent domain. It’s also linked in the right hand column under “City Documents”.