By John Brennan, The Record, Hackensack, N.J. Knight Ridder/Tribune Business News
Jun. 5--OCEANPORT, N.J.--North Jersey officials will push for an extension of NJ Transit's Bergen Line to bring mass transit to the Meadowlands Sports Complex, the complex's chief said Wednesday.
'We have the total commitment of all the people involved,' George Zoffinger, president of the New Jersey Sports and Exposition Authority, said during a meeting of his board of directors at Monmouth Park.
'The county is on board, the [New Jersey Meadowlands Commission] is on board, we're on board, New Jersey Transit is on board, the governor is on board. We have a consensus on where we want to do it. Next up is getting a consensus on how to pay for it.'
Zoffinger said the extension would feature a joint train station with the $1 billion Encap office and hotel project in southern Bergen County.
'We're trying to see if we can run trains directly from the Secaucus Transfer [Station],' Zoffinger said.
The transfer station, which is being built just a few miles from the sports complex, is intended as a nexus for New Jersey rail lines to New York.
The price tag for the 2- to 3-mile heavy rail extension is likely to surpass $100 million, but the $1.3 billion Mills/Mack-Cali mixed-use development on the Continental Arena site has produced bipartisan agreement that mass transit is crucial if the region is to avoid gridlock. The Bergen-Hudson Light Rail and Pascack Valley lines had been considered possible Meadowlands solutions, and interested parties had debated for years about which choice would be best.
Rep. Steve Rothman, D-Fair Lawn, who Zoffinger said is also 'on board' with the Bergen Line extension, will be asked to help find federal dollars for the project. State Sen. Paul Sarlo, D-Wood-Ridge, said he is working on 'alternate funding sources' beyond any federal money. Mills/Mack-Cali has committed to pay $65 million toward a combination of mass transit and road projects inside the complex and on nearby roads, such as Route 3.
'The most cost-effective and efficient way of getting rail to the Meadowlands immediately is the extension off the Bergen Line,' Sarlo said. 'I think it was everybody's dream to do an extension of the light rail, but, unfortunately, we're just not going to see that in the short term.'
Zoffinger will meet with Meadowlands-area mayors and other North Jersey elected officials Tuesday to lay out the plans in greater detail.
The rail spur probably would cross Berry's Creek at the southwestern corner of the sports complex near Route 3, veer east to run south of Giants Stadium, and then extend to the Continental Arena site, where the Mills/Mack-Cali project would be located.
Sarlo would like the line to be extended even further, heading west along the Paterson Plank corridor back toward Route 17 -- almost turning it into a complete loop. But he conceded that such an addition also could double the price of the project.
Zoffinger has put Xanadu -- the name Mills/Mack-Cali has given its office, entertainment, and retail project -- on the fast track. He hopes to sign a developer's agreement within a few weeks and have the companies break ground on the project by September.
The first components of the Xanadu plan could open as soon as 2006, and Meadowlands-area elected officials would like to see progress on the rail link mirror Xanadu's construction schedule.
A forum to lay out details of the 4.8 million-square-foot project to the public will be held within two weeks, probably on June 17 or 18. Mills/Mack-Cali officials say that Xanadu would include a minor-league baseball park, an indoor ski mountain, a giant bass-fishing store, an extreme sports park, and numerous restaurants.
The two losing bidders, Hartz Mountain Industries and Westfield, have not yet given up the fight.
Both are scheduled for one-day administrative hearings next week, when they will present Arthur Winkler, the sports authority's vice president of legal affairs, with their reasons for protesting the choice of Mills/Mack-Cali in March.
Hartz also is suing the sports authority, and it has appealed a ruling by Superior Court Judge Sybil Moses in May which denied Hartz's effort to enjoin the sports authority from continuing negotiations with Mills/Mack-Cali. In the suit, Hartz also said that the administrative hearing would be 'futile,' and a favorable decision on appeal could produce a cancellation of their hearing on Tuesday. Westfield, which has not filed a legal challenge, will be heard on Wednesday.
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(c) 2003, The Record, Hackensack, N.J. Distributed by Knight Ridder/Tribune Business News.
