Matawan explains rail station choice
Council members compare two options in presentation
BY MICHELLE ROSENBERG
Staff Writer

Above, commuters wait for the train at the Aberdeen-Matawan train station on Aug. 5. The area is the center of controversy due to possible redevelopment. At left, a sketch from the Columbia Group shows the transit village the Matawan Borough Council hopes to have after the area is redeveloped.

For the past few years, the Aberdeen-Matawan train station has been at the center of a controversial issue — redevelopment.

In light of recent criticisms, which were stirred up in part due to a Democratic press conference-turned-debate held on the steps of the station, the Matawan Borough Council decided to publicly discuss the Silver Oaks redevelopment proposal, which it rejected despite Aberdeen’s decision to work with the company.

SCOTTPILLING staff

At the Aug. 2 meeting, council President Paul Buccellato and Councilwoman Debra Buragina gave a presentation discussing the Silver Oaks plan in detail in an effort to showcase what they say were the real reasons they pulled out of an interlocal agreement with Aberdeen and decided to select Columbia Group’s plan.

They continuously stated that the Silver Oaks plan is simply not compatible with the borough of Matawan.

“Basically, when we looked at the plan, we just felt that it was way off-scale for our town,” Buragina said.

Buccellato read statements directly from the Silver Oaks proposal.

“Metro Park is the closest of the comparable development areas to the Station Plaza at Aberdeen/Matawan,” he said.

Buccellato also read details from the proposal stating that the plan was to have roughly 12,000 parking spaces and 2 million square feet of commercial, retail, residential and hotel space. He said that this plan would have left Matawan with 4,500 parking spaces and over 860,000 square feet of commercial and retail, along with two hotels to support the corporations in the commercial areas.

Buccellato said that the plan called for various multiple floor parking decks with multiple floor retail areas on top, leaving the borough with high rises with as many as 10 floors. The Silver Oaks plan also included 420 residential units on the Matawan side, he said. Buccellato and Buragina said that the borough did not feel comfortable with this proposal and were looking for a transit village rather then a Metro Park.

They decided to bring in the Columbia Group, which had also submitted a proposal. They said that the initial proposal presented to them was not exactly what they wanted, but they have been negotiating with them.

“We all agreed we would not sell Matawan down the drain,” Buccellato said.

No agreement will be signed until the borough is satisfied with every single detail, he said.

The original Columbia Group plan called for a hotel and close to 1,000 residential units, he said. The borough told Columbia Group to get rid of the hotel, and significantly reduce the number of residential units, he said. The group complied and scratched the hotel plan and has cut the number of proposed residences in half, he said. The borough is still negotiating to further decrease the number of residences, he said.

Buccellato said that the Columbia Group plan has been endorsed by NJ Transit, which owns some of the property in question.

“Everyone can’t be wrong and Aberdeen right,” he said.

Matawan and Aberdeen officials have been at odds lately, one blaming the other for wrongdoing, and each claiming to have the facts to back up their arguments. Both the borough and the township feel the other side is at fault for their failed interlocal agreement to redevelop both sides of the train station and the area surrounding it.

According to Aberdeen Township Manager Mark Coren, Matawan officials entered the agreement with Aberdeen, then changed their minds after state Sen. Joseph Kyrillos (R-Monmouth/Middlesex) convinced them to use another developer. Coren claims that Kyrillos, who represents both Aberdeen and Matawan, accepted over $50,000 in donations from Piscataway-based developer Jack Morris in exchange for getting then Matawan Mayor Rob Clifton and the council to enter an agreement with his company, Columbia Group.

Coren declined to comment further for this story.

Matawan officials say that they did enter an interlocal agreement with Aberdeen, and only pulled out after seeing the Silver Oaks proposal.

The Matawan council adopted a resolution in December 2002, and a series of time-sensitive resolutions thereafter designating Columbia Group as the company to work with, but have not signed anything locking them in, according to Jan Wouters, special council to the borough for redevelopment. A clause in the resolution is that an agreement must be signed between the borough and Columbia Group before anything is locked in, and that agreement is still being negotiated, he said.

Following the meeting, former Mayor Rob Clifton, who now sits on the Monmouth County Board of Chosen Freeholders, said that Aberdeen had been working with Silver Oaks for at least a year prior to Matawan’s knowledge that a redevelopment plan even existed. He said he received a phone call in the fall of 1999 from Kyrillos, who originally only represented Aberdeen, suggesting that the two municipalities work together because they share the station. Clifton said the borough then held a series of public hearings to get the thoughts of residents and local business owners. Once NJ Transit came in and starting condemning property, the borough decided to develop a plan to keep that from happening again, he said.

Clifton said the borough decided to move in a different direction because the request for proposal (RFP) did not sit well with them. Aberdeen chose Silver Oaks, which they had been working with for a year prior to the interlocal agreement, and Matawan chose Columbia Group, which they continue to negotiate with today, he said.

The redevelopment plan remains tied up in litigation. Silver Oaks filed a lawsuit against Matawan after the borough’s decision to work with another company. There will be no redevelopment on either side of the train station until all litigation is solved.