The Moishe’s Moving and Storage Building in Hamilton Park will be getting new tenants: Computers.
Sure, there will be a couple of people in the building, but the bulk of the space in the old warehouse on Coles Street will be devoted to servers and wires devoted to the powering of computer networks. The high-ceilinged, thick-walled and windowless buildings are exactly the types of places companies like Highgate of Manhattan like for their tenants, said Jon Glickman, vice president for the company.
Glickman explained that his company helps provide telecommunications space for companies.
“Also, we have hotels,” said Glickman. “These are for human beings.”
Highgate has helped provide servers for Raytheon, the Massachusetts-based defense contractor, and the Washington Post Building in Washington, D.C., Glickman said.
The plan for the building was passed unanimously at the city’s Planning Board meeting last week, but not before issues of parking and potential “disaster” employees was taken care of.
According to Glickman, about 90,000 square feet of the 800,000 square foot building would be devoted to “disaster recovery.” Empty space on most days, it could expand dramatically in a disaster situation. For instance, if CS First Boston in Manhattan is bombed, provisions are made to move any remaining employees to an emergency location, so that business can continue.
In that event, Glickman estimated the space could see an additional two- to three hundred human occupants.
Nevertheless, Glickman insisted, “We’re going to be a relatively quiet tenant.”
Glickman originally requested 198 parking spaces for the site, but that figure was reduced to 150 over concerns that the building abuts a historic district and is a high-traffic site.
Highgate will also be donating an acre to green space, to be used ostensibly as park land for some later date. The company will receive monetary incentives for donating land to the city under a recent law change. The company also agreed to take down a ramp and platform on the Monmouth Street side of the property.
Mocco gets approval
A developer who had previously paved a pair of parking lots without the city’s permission finally garnered Planning Board blessing this week.
Peter Mocco, the former North Bergen mayor and county freeholder, got the nod for “interim use” of an outdoor tent and bar at his Sand Bar, USA site at the foot of Marin Blvd., along with a parking plan and an RV park. The use has a limit of three years.
All of these items, it should be noted, already exist.
Mocco, who has a long, litigious history with the city, had rankled board members this summer by paving a thousand-space lot prior to getting approval from either the Planning Board or the building department. One planning member threatened to tear the lot up, and Mocco was issued a fine.
Mocco paved another spot of public roadway in the Hamilton Park area shortly thereafter.
This week’s approval was settled quickly and surprisingly quietly. Mocco appeared contrite, and planning members appeared satisfied.
Mocco plans to develop a massive residential community on his approximately 80-acre Liberty Harbor North site. A preliminary plan, according to Mocco partner Jeff Zak, should be before the board some time this month.
Newport gets another hotel, of the human kind
A 23 story, 414 room “full service hotel” at 475 Washington Blvd. in Newport got approval from the board this week, making three hotels in an area where, a year ago, there were none.
“We’re ready to make a world-class city from what was once a dockland,” said Jamie LeFrak, a representative for the Lefrak Organization.
The hotel will include a 25,000 square foot conference center and ballroom, according to the developers. Newport anticipates the project will be completed sometime in early 2002.