Jackson council votes unanimously to put brakes on plan for 1,000 new high density housing units

JACKSON TOWNSHIP, NJ—The Jackson Township Council voted unanimously on Tuesday to close a loophole that would have allowed an additional 1,000 homes at the Adventure Crossing project in Jackson Township.

Council President Jen Kuhn said she and the council acted after a concerned resident brought it to her attention. The resident saw a news article posted on a real estate trade magazine’s website stating that the developer was advertising 1,200 homes in an advertisement to solicit new investors.

Kuhn said she remembered that only a few hundred homes had been approved for the site, so she and fellow councilman Mordy Burnstein investigated. During their research into the zoning, they found a loophole that would have allowed the developer to build homes based on the entire Adventure Crossing project acreage.

The new ordinance will limit developers from calculating their maximum housing unit density only on residentially zoned portions of the project, limiting the number of units that can be built.

“This is not only a quality of life issue for nearby residents, it’s a traffic safety issue for people communicating through the 537 corridor,” she said. “This was the right thing to do for Jackson and for its residents.”

Councilman Burnstein expressed concern about the traffic and the problems associated with adding an additional 1,000 housing units.

“Jackson residents came to us to express their concern about this new plan for hundreds more homes, it caught us all by surprise,” Burnstein said. “We reacted by immediately closing the loophole and ensuring that the project stayed on course with their initial promise to Jackson Township, which was commercial and entertainment with some mixed-use residential-commercial buildings.”

“The ordinance reinforces our commitment as residents’ elected representatives on this Council to stop and protect our town from overdevelopment and high-density housing that will help keep our town a suburban community,” said Councilman Nino Borrelli. “Development in our town is a big issue and concern we continually hear about from many residents on. We’ll continue to address it on the Council. I always say we can’t stop or prohibit development. Still, we can limit and reign in too much by zoning ordinance and buying available and valuable land for open space preservation.”

Borrelli said his decision to vote yes was because the town is taking action and getting ahead of it, preventing approximately 800 or more housing units from being built between Adventure Crossing and Great Adventure in Jackson. This would detrimentally impact the traffic issues already occurring in that area of our town.

“With this ordinance, we’re limiting the impact to Jackson residents who live in that area and the people who frequent that area of our town out by Adventure Crossing and Great Adventure. Our goal on the Council will continue to protect Jackson’s unique environment and abundant resources as best as possible,” he added.

The council voted 5-0, with Councilmen Scott Sargent and Stephen Chisolm, Jr. also voting in favor.

No Jackson residents spoke out against the new ordinance.

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