Celadon: $2B Transit-Oriented, LEED-ND Mixed-Use in the Swamps of Jersey

February 12th, 2008 • Related • Filed Under

Celadon is a bold 12-year, $2 billion project on the Elizabeth, New Jersey waterfront that’s being developed by Hoboken-based Tern Group. The development, which sits on the site of a former landfill on the banks of the Newark Bay, will transform 30 acres into a retail, residential, and hotel destination that will include ferry service into Manhattan. It’s also a LEED for Neighborhood Development (“LEED-ND”) Pilot Project that’s only five minutes from Newark Liberty International Airport and fifteen minutes (without any traffic) from Manhattan, adjacent to the Jersey Gardens shopping outlet and IKEA at Exist 13A of the New Jersey Turnpike. Eventually, Tern hopes to build a monorail or light rail that will connect the project to the airport.

When totally built out, Celadon will offer 4,000 residential units across 14 different towers, 1,200 hotel rooms, 400,000 square feet of office space, and 150,000 square feet of retail. Tern also plans to build a 1,000 foot long waterfront promenade along the Newark Bay, including a marina. Tern purchased the site in 2006 for $31.5 million and is essentially betting that the success which other developers have had further up New Jersey’s Gold Coast along the Hudson will be replicated due south; as its managing member Dil Hoda told the Star-Ledger, “I don’t know why people have discounted Newark Bay. This is waterfront property in metropolitan New York.”

Elizabeth itself has never followed through on years of promises to implement ferry service through the Newark Bay into Manhattan, but last June the Union County Improvement Authority agreed to issue $19.5 million in bonds for the ferry terminal and promenade. Back in December, the project site plan was approved, and last month the New Jersey DEP issued a waterfront development permit for the site. As construction on the terminal commences, Tern will begin to move the retail and residential components of the project forward. Mr. Hoda hopes that these efforts will get underway by late spring. Details on specific green design features aren’t available yet, but Celadon will include 3.5 acres of parks, graywater systems, solar and wind energy sources, and efficient lighting and mechanical systems throughout each of the development’s towers.

As Mr. Hoda also noted, the project site “has attributes that no other site on the Eastern Seaboard has.” Provided that it moves forward as planned, Celadon has the potential to become a truly watershed green project here in the New York City metropolitan area. By incorporating sustainable design principles on a formerly contaminated site that quite literally sits in between the most highly trafficked highway in the Northeast and one of the country’s busiest airports, coupled with ferry service into the Financial District, the project, if executed properly, could become a paradigm for future development in our area. It’s far too early to tell, but we’re definitely interested in seeing whether Tern is able to realize what amounts to a truly ambitious vision for the New Jersey waterfront.