Rahway sees cash for cleanups as boon to downtown projects

In Rahway, where an ambitious development agenda was slowed by the recession, city officials say new state money for environmental cleanups could jump-start nine downtown projects.

When the state designated properties in six municipalities as new brownfield development areas, Rahway was on the list, one of 31 towns throughout the state eligible for $5 million each year for cleanups. The goal of the program, beyond remediating polluted ground, is to revitalize communities.

The brownfield designations in Rahway cover nine downtown sites along the Rahway River, including land that was at various times home to a factory for Wheatena cereal, a welding business and a gas station. Another site had served as an auto garage and an industrial dry-cleaning business.

Local officials hope the state money will revitalize the city by funding the cleanup needed to begin new projects, including an arts complex that officials hope could change Rahway's identity from a commuter-driven economy to a creative one.

"Rahway will be an arts destination," said Rahway business administrator Peter Pelissier, "and that's why people will move to Rahway."

One of the city's top priorities is redeveloping a contaminated site on Hamilton Street near the Union County Performing Arts Center that was an industrial laundry business. The city plans to clean it up with the state funding and then bond about $7 million to build another performing arts center by 2011, according to the mayor.

"You're talking about a very contaminated site that wouldn't otherwise be cleaned up," said Thomas Uzzo, the president of an engineering company hired by the city for the project.

The laundry business is long-closed, but solvents that could cause cancer are still present on the property.

"It was an industrial dry cleaner, it wasn't like your typical little corner dry cleaner," Uzzo said. "The groundwater remediation and the soil remediation will be costly propositions."

Just how costly the state-funded clean-up will be isn't clear yet, but the work needed is extensive.

According to the city's engineers, before the site can be developed, dense soil must be removed, and groundwater must be cleaned either by pumping it through a well-like structure and treating it, or by injecting microorganisms that can break down solvents.

The city's application to the Department of Environmental Protection said that within 18 months, the former Hamilton Laundry site will be an 1,100-seat amphitheater.

The project would also include a black box theater next door, as well as the conversion of a 54-unit apartment building into affordable housing "geared toward artists."

The project was a brainstorm of Rahway Mayor James Kennedy, according to Pelissier. He said the project will help Rahway change its identity from a transit-oriented community centered on the train station and commuters, to a creative community attracting a new breed of resident.

Kennedy said on Friday that the city is on the verge of picking an architect for the project.

Eliot Caroom is a reporter for the New Jersey Local News Service. He may be reached at (908) 243-6215 or ecaroom@njlns.com.