HOBOKEN–The Hudson County Board of Chosen Freeholders voted Tuesday to uphold a 2012 decision by the county Planning Board to reject a plan to build two 11-story residential towers on a pier on the northeast corner of Hoboken. The ruling will prevent Shipyard Associates LP from moving forward with construction of its controversial Monarch at Shipyard project for the time being, although the Freeholders’ ruling falls under the jurisdiction of a New Jersey appellate court and could be subject to further legal challenges.
The Monarch pier, which juts out into Weehawken Cove, is the last undeveloped portion of a Planned Unit Development (PUD) that has already added over 1,000 high-end residential units to the North End of Hoboken. Shipyard had promised to build tennis courts and parking on the pier in a 1997 agreement, but in 2011 decided to seek two additional buildings totaling 78 residential units instead.
The three-year fight over the Monarch project has pitted Applied Development, Hoboken’s largest developer and Shipyard’s parent company, against the city’s current political establishment, which is nearly unanimous in its opposition to the project.
Based on the public response at Tuesday’s hearing, many Hoboken residents share their elected officials’ anti-Monarch sentiment. Over 100 people attended the meeting, which was held in Hoboken at the Wallace School cafeteria rather than in Jersey City like most Freeholder meetings, and the crowd clapped loudly for everyone who spoke in opposition to the Monarch plans.
Five freeholders voted to uphold the rejection. In explaining his motion that the Planning Board decision be affirmed without conditions, Freeholder Bill O’Dea cited the “ample concerns” raised with respect to the Monarch project’s effect on traffic conditions.
Freeholder Anthony Romano, who represents Hoboken and Jersey City Heights, was not present on Tuesday, having recused himself on the advice of freeholder board legal counsel Carmen Mendiola due to his active membership on the Planning Board.
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