Long-vacated pier in Gloucester City may soon get two apartment buildings

A North Jersey developer wants to build 364 apartments on a Delaware River pier site that has long inspired Gloucester City’s dreams of economic revitalization.

It’s not the first time this long-struggling little city in the shadow of the Walt Whitman Bridge has been wooed for its waterfront, and there’s no shortage of skeptics. But supporters have high hopes for the latest proposal.

The $100 million Freedom Pier Development at King and Cumberland Streets would include a seven-story building on the pier itself and an eight-story building along King Street, each with parking underneath. The larger building would offer 10,000 square feet of retail and restaurant space as well as residential.

“We are very excited about the opportunity to be here,” said Craig Ryno, vice president for real estate at Meridia Capodagli Property. The Union County firm has built more than 3,000 apartments, mostly in north and central New Jersey, and plans to offer market-rate rents in Gloucester City, with studios starting at $1,400, one-bedrooms at $1,600, and two-bedrooms at $1,900.

“Overwhelmingly positive” is how Ryno described public reaction to the proposal during presentations he made in the city last year.

Yet Holt Logistics Corp., which has its headquarters, cranes, and warehouse facilities next to Freedom Pier, has raised concerns.

In letters filed with city officials in July and August, Joseph F. Kessler, the Philadelphia lawyer representing Holt, sought to postpone the planning board’s approval of a revised redevelopment plan for the pier.

Kessler also asserted in the letters that the Meridia project as proposed would violate the terms of Holt’s 99-year lease with the city for its headquarters in the former immigration and Coast Guard station building.

“We’re hoping to meet with Holt in the near future to work something out that will be favorable to both the city and the company because Holt has been such a good partner with the city over the years,” Mayor Dayl Baile said.

Citing what he described as one of the company’s concerns — that the project would compromise the view of the Delaware from the headquarters — Baile said he’s hopeful the location or design of the proposed buildings could be adjusted, if necessary.

The mayor also said the planning board approved the redevelopment plan amendment so Meridia could seek authorization for the project from state environmental and preservation agencies.

Baile said the city began talking with Meridia two years ago, under the leadership of former Mayor Dan Spencer. “Over the years, other proposals have not come to fruition,” he said. “But we believe this project will help transform the city.”

Settled by Europeans in 1623 and celebrating what’s being called its 400+year anniversary, the 2.3-square-mile city of 11,229 once was the fishing and hunting grounds of the Lenni Lenape people.

The city is now known for the Irish heritage shared by many residents and claims to have hosted the wedding of Betsy Ross, as well as early live performances by rock and roll pioneer Bill Haley.

But Gloucester City also is among the countless American working-class towns that major industries left behind long ago. In the decades after the city’s population peaked at 14,000 in 1950, once-mighty employers such as New Jersey Zinc, Harshaw Chemical, and GAF closed their facilities in the city one after another.

» READ MORE: A real estate website brands Gloucester City as N.J.’s ‘cheapest place to live’ — and locals say that’s OK

By 1985, the city was seriously entertaining a proposal from a developer with a fanciful scheme to turn Gloucester into “Hollywood East” by building movie theaters and TV studios on abandoned industrial sites. Nothing happened, and in the years since, less grandiose proposals for Freedom Pier also came and went, including a somewhat controversial 2012 effort to secure an outpost of the South Jersey-based Ott’s bar and grill chain.

“As a resident and as a journalist who has been following this for years, I won’t believe [Meridia] is going to happen until I see the shovels, and the dirt actually being dug,” said Bill Cleary, 78, whose Cleary’s Note Book website closely covers city news.

In 2021, Cleary wrote and posted a detailed account of four decades’ worth of ”failed waterfront development” in the city. The story featured Hollywood East along with other unbuilt projects with names such as Gloucester Vista, along with what was touted as the first organic waste-to-energy/compost recycling facility in America.

Said Cleary: “Once I see the pilings going in, I’ll feel a little more comfortable saying, ‘Yay.’ Because I would love to see it.”

On a recent afternoon, several King Street residents expressed skepticism while others were more optimistic about the Meridia proposal.

“I’m opposed to it,” said Eileen Murphy, who lives in the Gloucester Towne senior complex between Freedom Pier and Proprietor’s Park.

“I’m on the fourth floor of the north side, and I’m going to lose my view,” said Murphy, 66. “Right now, I can see everything. After they’re done, all I’ll be able to see is a building.”

Jim Fritz, a 63-year-old retired restaurant worker who also lives in Gloucester Towne, said the Meridia proposal would be “great and help revitalize” the city where he was born.

“It’s been decades they’ve been planning and talking about it, and nothing’s happened except more houses got condemned and boarded up,” he said.

Wilson Feliciano, 46, a landscaper who lives just north of the pier on King Street, said he would welcome the development, as long as local residents could continue to use the wide, brick-paved walkway around the perimeter. And forklift operator Jerry Hall, 25, agreed that the walkway and views of the river “need to stay open for the people and the kids who like to come out here.”

Although the older, rowhouse-lined western side of town is punctuated in many places by vacant lots and forlorn buildings, Gloucester City has in recent years attracted new residents and businesses.

“A lot of things still need to happen for Gloucester City, and I’m hopeful developments like [Freedom Pier] and others that are breaking ground can help steer the city in the right direction,” said Jamie Blanchard, who opened Royal Mile Coffee Roasters last year on Paul Street, west of Broadway.

Having 364 apartments “may bring some new life to the area,” he said.

Meanwhile, a trio of vacant west side landmarks ― the Costello School, the Gloucester Catholic annex, and O’Hara’s tavern — are slated for redevelopment.

And last December, a New York-based real estate website crowned the city “the cheapest place to live” in New Jersey.

The city’s relative affordability has carried over into 2023. Last Friday, Zillow listed 14 Gloucester City houses, ranging from a detached four-bedroom in a more suburban-like part of town for $340,000 to a three-bedroom twin in a more typical neighborhood for $168,000.

Baile and other Gloucester boosters welcomed the “cheapest” recognition as helpful, rather than harmful, to the city’s prospects. They cite the city’s location, the projected start of construction on a Glassboro-Camden light rail line during this decade, and the interest among apartment and condo developers in older South Jersey cities such as Burlington and Woodbury as evidence that things are looking up in Gloucester City.

“We haven’t seen this much redevelopment in years,” said city economic development director Lori Ryan, who, like the mayor, is Gloucester City born-and-raised.

Freedom Pier, she said, “will be a catalyst for growth.”