By Joshua Burd (reposted from Real Estate NJ)
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Russo Development and River Development are nearing the completion of more than 211,000 square feet of new logistics space just off Interstate 280 in Kearny.

The firms on Monday said the project, located at 1100 Harrison Ave., will bring new life to a former manufacturing site that was contaminated but has since been cleaned up. They’re now on track to deliver the speculative industrial building during the fourth quarter, seeking to capitalize on a location that is less than six miles from Newark Liberty International Airport, nine miles from Port Newark-Elizabeth and just under 11 miles from Midtown Manhattan.

They added that the single-story, 211,287-square-foot distribution center will have 38-foot clear ceiling heights, 41 loading docks and parking for 251 cars and 64 trailers, along with office space built to the tenants’ specifications.

“The most critical factor in logistics is project location. At Russo, we strategically select our locations to maximize efficiency and transportation costs for our tenants and that is exactly what 1100 Harrison Avenue’s location will provide, located less than a mile from the New Jersey Turnpike,” said Michael Pembroke, chief operating officer at Russo Development. “The connectivity that this development offers to New Jersey will be invaluable for our future tenant.”

River Development sourced the property in an off-market deal, according to a news release. Working closely with the multigenerational business owners, the firm advised and executed preclosing environmental remediation across local, state and federal agencies, while working with Russo and local officials in Kearny to lay the groundwork for the redevelopment.

NAI James E. Hanson’s Tom Vetter and Jeff DeMagistris lead the leasing team for the property.

“Russo Development was the partner of choice for us as much for their integrity as their bandwidth,” said Warren Waters, a principal and partner with River Development. “We interact with a wide cross-section of the company and its not a coincidence that we are developing multiple projects together.”

The firms noted that 1100 Harrison Ave. will have excess parking in a supply-constrained market and is minutes from other major highways including the New Jersey Turnpike and interstates 80 and 78. In addition, there is a workforce of more than 4.8 million within a 15-mile radius of the development and some 50 million consumers within a day’s drive.
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Additionally, the site is within Kearny’s Urban Enterprise Zone, making it eligible for incentives such as a 50 percent reduction in sales tax for retail customers, corporate employee tax credits and priority financial assistance in accordance with state programs, the news release said.

East Brunswick, NJ:  The Mayor of East Brunswick, Brad Cohen, formally announced the groundbreaking of Vermella East Brunswick, the ambitious redevelopment along the Route 18 Corridor in his town today. “This project by River Development Equities and Russo Development will set a new standard for future developments as this project is unique and second to none,” said the Mayor. 

The first phase of the development will consist of luxury apartments, retail shops, and restaurants, along with an outstanding combination of indoor and outdoor amenities.

Event Photos (© 2022 River Development Equities. All Rights Reserved)

Developers: River Development Equities + Russo Development
Landscape Architect: Melillo Bauer Carman
Architectural Team: Shore Point Architecture + Studio 200
Civil Engineer: Insite Engineering
Traffic Engineer: Langan Engineering 
Planner: Stonefield Engineering
Legal Counsel: Michael A. Bruno - Giordano, Halleran & Ciesla 

By Jeffrey White 

With several land remediation and redevelopment projects recently completed, River Development Equities, LLC is establishing itself as a leading re-developer of contaminated urban properties in the Northeast. Notable projects include the Hess Oil Terminal in Bogota, NJ, the Republic Container property in Jersey City, the Belford seafood co-op in Port Monmouth, as well as a current project at exit 15W of the NJ Turnpike. 

I sat down with River’s Managing Member, Warren Waters, to learn about what makes the firm unique in this industry.

​Many business owners in the Industrial Northeast face similar challenges in deciding when to sell their manufacturing or supply operations, many of which have been in the family for generations. While there are differences in the type of business, type of property, and exit strategies, many of the decisions and impacts to the seller are similar. Regardless of whether a business is family-owned, a private company, or a public corporation, the mechanics are similar. Upon engagement, River Development must execute the same strategic checklist to advance. 

​The value of the business must be quantified, and the process for the subsequent sale initiated. Typically, there is a requirement upon sale to relocate the business. Relocation requires a tremendous amount of coordination. River Development must identify and offer the purchaser a variety of options and then analyze equipment price, relocation, fit-up in the new facility, and negotiation of the new lease or purchase terms. 

​In addition to managing all of these moving parts, River must identify the nature and extent of the environmental clean-up, execute an approved clean-up plan, and finally complete the remediation before the site's redevelopment. This subsequent remediation will typically distance the seller from liability and relieve their anxiety about the remediation's challenges and unknown expense. It is this package of services that River Development is positioned to deliver.

River needs to contemplate what could be built on the property, and ultimately manage the Federal, State, and Municipal regulatory and approval process that promotes the business to be sold. The value for the seller rests in the economic understanding of what amount of money the business and the land are each worth. River Development's vision, effort, and plan execution ultimately allowed the seller to reap the financial benefits of both. 

Our company's vertical approach to identifying, planning, and delivering this multi-faceted protocol is the difference between confusion and the seller's economic reward. Compare this with River Dev creating a turnkey solution that provided financial, emotional, technical, and professional guidance. It's vital to mention emotional support because, in our experience, even the most secure of business executives get overwhelmed when faced with all of the challenges coming at them at once. 

​Land remediation and redevelopment is a legal process. We are clear from the beginning that to successfully complete the entire protocol correctly, it takes at least 24 months, assuming no significant issues arise. It is in our company's DNA to anticipate and plan for the unexpected roadblocks. 

Once a business has put its trust in our hands, excuses and delays are not an acceptable outcome. The business owners we deal with are experts in what they have created but letting go and putting their future in someone else’s hands is daunting.

We do this to create an economic value for the company, which we will benefit from in the future. Once we have committed to a business owner that we will complete the process, we must maintain sincerity and integrity. Once we commence the remediation we stay with it to completion. Phasing is contemplated by design if necessary.

There are always unexpected issues during a land remediation and redevelopment project. If we are not flexible or cannot adapt, we do not belong in this industry and should not be attempting to execute our specific business model.
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River Development's landowner clients are always happy when the wire transfer hits their account. Without the services we provide, there is little chance to create the successful solution we deliver to our sellers.

By Linda Moss | CoStar News | February 7, 2020 | 2:49 P.M.
SOURCE: ​https://product.costar.com/home/news/shared/895926697

Developer Warren Waters, despite being a proud self-proclaimed New Jersey native, said his firm had to travel to the West Coast seeking innovative design inspiration for a $500 million project in the central part of the Garden State.
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Waters, a principal and partner of River Development Equities, and officials from the township of East Brunswick unveiled a conceptual plan for a mixed-use redevelopment slated for a blighted 45-acre site on the busy Route 18 commercial corridor in Middlesex County.

River Development, based in Red Bank, will incorporate some of the most successful live-work-play design elements that it discovered during trips to Texas and California into its plan for the East Brunswick location, according to Waters.
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"We have spent the time traveling out west, traveling to places like Austin, Texas, certainly up and down the coast of California, into Seattle and even in Chicago," he said. "Generally the cutting-edge architectural designs — how people live, what they do — tend to really reach the East Coast last. This is historical. This isn’t any insider information. Historically, a lot of great ideas have started in areas other than the Northeast, and the Northeast has been very traditional."

That research will inform the East Brunswick project, which will feature 800 residential units, retail space such as restaurants and shops, a hotel, a tech center, a medical-services office facility, public parking, a plaza, a mass-transit hub, an amphitheater, open space and potentially a new municipal center.

East Brunswick, which is near New Brunswick and its Rutgers University, has designated River Development as the company to revitalize properties between Ruth and Lake streets on Route 18, a state highway. The area includes several ailing shopping centers, including the largely vacant Loehmann’s Plaza, victims of the nationwide trials and tribulations of brick-and-mortar retail. The aim is to create a vibrant live-work-play area, a dynamic downtown, for East Brunswick.

A number of New Jersey suburban municipalities, such as Montclair and Hanover, are also trying to find ways to revive sections that have been left with vacant or nearly empty shopping centers, which become eyesores and generate less local tax revenue than when they were occupied. In New Jersey, the revival process typically entails declaring a land parcel as "an area in need of redevelopment," naming a developer and executing an agreement with that real estate firm for the project.

East Brunswick, under the leadership of Mayor Brad Cohen, two years ago created its own municipal redevelopment agency to spearhead the Route 18 project. The agency's executive director, Mike Hughes, said the aim is "to redevelop, revitalize and reimagine" that highway corridor, which has over 100,000 cars a day in traffic, for the next generation.
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The area along Route 18 "due to the changing nature of retail had fallen into blighted condition in the wake of the Great Recession," Cohen said. From the 1970s to the 1990s, shopping plazas that were home to retailers such as now-defunct chains Loehmann's and The Wiz were so popular "you couldn't find parking spots in most of those areas because all those stores were busy," according to the mayor.

"That's changed," he said.

Township residents lament the fact that quality retailers don't open up shop in East Brunswick, but that's because the existing shopping centers are outdated, according to Hughes. The redevelopment will offer modern sites, he said.
"You’re going to have a retail corridor here that isn’t just built for today but built for tomorrow," Hughes said. "And it’s going to be designed thoughtfully."

Much of the commercial real estate in New Jersey "is pretty typical, born out of economics, necessity, born out of not really thinking too far into the future," according to Waters. But the East Brunswick project is envisioned as something "that people want to live in tomorrow," he said.

"It means that we’re going to break the mold," Waters said. "We’re going to do things they’re doing in other parts of the country, very successfully, and it should capture anyone that drives by, let alone anyone who lives here or who works here."

For example, people in the western United States are willing to spend more time outdoors than New Jersey residents may consider typical, according to Waters. In other parts of the country, real estate properties are designed for people to be outside, he said. In Los Angles, outdoor escalators transport people from one level of a building to another, according to Waters. And even in Chicago, there are venues for residents to dine and eat outdoors even in the winter, he said.
"We want people to be outside, to be engaged," Waters said.

While some New Jersey mixed-use developments are plagued by large surface parking lots, most of the parking for the East Brunswick redevelopment won't be visible from the street. Its buildings with have two to three levels of parking beneath them, according to River Development officials.

The company during the next three months will acquire the properties within the redevelopment zone from respective land owners. Demolition work on the site is expected to start by the late summer.
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[email protected]
@biz_moss

East Brunswick Redevelopment: Big Changes to Route 18
December 6, 2019 at 3:19 PM (SOURCE: Tapinto.net/east-brunswick By MAUREEN BERZOK)

EAST BRUNSWICK, NJ -  For those residents and commuters who are getting tired of looking at abandoned properties on Route 18 south like the Wiz/Gap Plaza or many empty stores at the former Loehmann's Plaza, help is on its way.
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This past week the East Brunswick Redevelopment Agency has entered into an agreement with River Development Equities of Red Bank to manage 45 acres of the Redevelopment Zone between Ruth Street and Tices Lane on Route 18 South, extending back to the Lake Apartments.  As described earlier in the Redevelopment Plan, the property will host a mixture of residences, retail establishments, public parking, and a hotel.  Some public amenities, possibly some police or community services, will also be included.  The centerpiece, and the first area to be constructed, will be a third bus terminal for the township as part of a "transit-oriented development." 
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The agreement reached with the EB Development Agency allows River Development to manage the full project which will be built in phases over a period of approximately ten years.  River Development can now start land acquisition at the site, making deals and purchases with the various owners of the affected properties.  Some properties have lain dormant for several years, while others are still open and active.  In an interview with TAPinto East Brunswick, Mayor Brad Cohen said that it was now the responsibility of the developer to negotiate with the current owners during the initial "property-acquistion phase."

Cohen explained why the township agency decided to go with River Development: "They presented the most innovative plan, a coherent plan for a 45-acre track."  Other developers, explained Cohen, wanted to break the unit into smaller parcels.  He also indicated that for River, that "This would be a marquee development, a centerpiece, and a top priority."  He expressed confidence in the judgment and creativity of Warren Waters of River, who will lead the project.

"This will be the greatest change to the Route 18 corridor since the 1970's - 50 years ago, " said Cohen.

He added, "I look at this as a positive.  We are getting rid of properties that are a blight.  They are contributing very little taxes and have the township wrapped up in tax litigation.  Ironically, it costs money to keep them in the condition they are in."
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"This is prime real estate in the heart of New Jersey and it hasn't changed in a major way in more than 40 years.  The model for suburban living has changed and East Brunswick needs to be adaptable to that lifestyle.  We need to be flexible and thinking of trends.  The key is adaptability, " said Cohen.
The new development will be "attractive and affordable" for young people and older people looking to downsize.  There will be an emphasis on entertainment, higher-end grocery stores, and a walkable community.  

​"There were 101 new businesses in East Brunswick last year.  It was the third year of major growth in the township, "said Cohen.  "We are ready for this new development."

SOURCE: Tapinto.net/east-brunswick
By MAUREEN BERZOK
December 6, 2019 at 3:19 PM
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