Mayor James Fife (c.) is flanked by Harrison Station 330 developers Richard Miller (l.) of Pegasus Group and Dave Barry of Ironstate Development.
HARRISON –
In what has become a happy habit for the Town of Harrison, municipal officials joined with a development team to celebrate the opening of yet another residential project in the town’s waterfront-development area last Thursday.
This one was for Harrison Station 330, a four-story row of upscale rental apartments and future ground-floor retail along Angelo Cifelli Drive on the west side of Frank E. Rodgers Blvd., just a short walk from the Harrison PATH station.
The third project to be completed by a joint venture of Pegasus Group and Ironstate Development, this phase offers tenants a choice of 60 studios, 240 one-bedrooms and 32 two-bedrooms, plus various amenities.
Those include a health club and an outdoor pool to be shared by occupants of the joint venture’s 275- unit/20,000 square feet of retail development at 300 Somerset St. Residents of Harrison Station 330 will also enjoy a tastily furnished lobby/lounge, a lounge with business bar, an additional lounge with ping pong and a landscaped courtyard with barbecues, fire pit and lawn area.
Still to come, according to the partners, are four additional phases of development which, when combined with the already-finished projects, will yield a total of 2,250 residential units and 80,000 square feet of retail, plus the 138-room Element Hotel.
Ironstate principal Greg Russo said the firms should be ready to break ground “in about a month” for their next phase, a 411-unit apartment complex and a new garage with 1,000 deck spaces that will provide parking for tenants in all buildings.
Among the future stages of construction, said Russo, will be the joint venture’s first for-sale enterprise: some 100 condominium units are planned, he added.
A view of a bedroom in one of the new apartments.
Full build-out of the remaining phases will take “four to five years,” Russo said.
Russo said it cost $70 million to put up Harrison Station 330, for which Fields Construction of Hoboken was the general contractor, and he credited PNC Bank with providing construction financing. “Our next phase will probably run about $105 million,” he said.
Harrison Station 330, which has three fully-furnished model apartments available for public viewing, already has about 25 apartments occupied and “about 20%” of the complex is already leased to a mixture of Hudson County and New York residents ranging in age from their 20s to 40s, and some with “small children,” Russo said.
The Somerset St. development is virtually full and the Element hotel is averaging around 70 to 75% occupancy, he said.
At Harrison Station 330, monthly rentals for studios averaging 450 square feet range from $1,600 to $1,900; one-bedrooms averaging 700 square feet, $1,800 to $2,300; and two-bedrooms averaging 1,000 square feet, $2,500 to $3,000, Russo said.
While there are, as yet, no signed leases for any of the 9,600 square feet of retail space, Russo said that negotiations are in process with an Italian restaurant and a micro brewery, among other possible tenants.
“Our goal has always been to create a vibrant mixed-use community in Harrison in the same vein as Hoboken and Jersey City that respects the local fabric,” said Pegasus principal Richard Miller. “The pedestrian-friendly design and easy access to masstransit service has clearly appealed to professionals and those interested in New Urbanism lifestyle.”
On another redevelopment front, meanwhile, the Harrison Planning Board last Wednesday reviewed plans for another project at the former Hartz Mountain property on the east side of Frank E. Rodgers Blvd. where the Heller Group of Madison wants to build 600 apartments to be spread among five buildings, including one for 11 stories. The board took no action, pending continuing testimony by experts on the plan.
