Somerset County Regional Center Vision Initiative

The Somerset County Regional Center is an incredibly diverse and interesting landscape. It is also fractured in terms of its built form, open space resources, pedestrian connections and ultimately, community. Clearly, there are many wonderful pieces in the Regional Center landscape - beautiful residential neighborhoods, lively downtown shopping streets, stately corporate campuses. The problem though, is that ​“the total is less than the sum of its parts”.

“Sustainable development” in a maturing metropolis, such as the greater New York-New Jersey metropolitan area, is not only a matter of how new ​“greenfield” development takes place, but even more a matter of retrofitting, connecting and completing places like the Somerset County Regional Center. The goal should be to do this in ways that create a sense of place and community, while maintaining the unique suburban character and quality of life that developers, retailers, local officials and home-buyers demand.

The results of the Regional Center Vision Initiative Workshop summarized in this report, as well as the Regional Plan Association’s work elsewhere in the region, underscores two of the fundamental issues with retrofitting ​“edge cities”: the scale of these places in an unplanned setting defeats any attempt at a synergistic and comprehensive development and redevelopment, and sprawl patterns do not support significant transit and pedestrian oriented improvements that compact centers are able to provide.

The Regional Center Vision Initiative

The Regional Center of Somerset County consists of the Boroughs of Raritan and Somerville and portions of the Township of Bridgewater. These municipalities jointly received official center designation from the NJ State Planning Commission in 1996. The Regional Center was the first trimunicipal center in the State. The Regional Center Partnership of Somerset County Inc., a non-profit organization, was established to provide a coordinated planning framework for the center so as to enhance the quality of life for its residents, while providing a favorable environment for business. The Regional Center Partnership is made up of representatives from the three communities, the County of Somerset, Somerset County Chamber of Commerce, Somerset Alliance for the Future, Somerset Coalition for Smart Growth, Somerset County Coalition on Affordable Housing and the private sector.

The Regional Center Vision Initiative brought together a broad cross section of design professionals, planners, elected officials and civic associations for an intensive five-day workshop. The purpose was to envision the next twenty years of growth based on the principles of sustainable and center based growth. Interdisciplinary teams of architects, landscape architects and urban designers worked with local government and non-profit agencies to address these design issues from three different points of view:

• The ​“Points” Team - reinforcing existing concentrations of land uses and the connections among them;
• The ​“Lines” Team - reexamining the role of the major and minor highway corridors in shaping development patterns and enhancing mobility through carefully planned infrastructure improvements; and
• The ​“Planes” Team- establishing the role of natural systems in guiding future development.

While design of the center was the primary focus of this workshop, two other parallel working groups were convened: one focusing on transportation issues and another focusing on implementation and policy issues. Jeff Zupan, Senior Fellow for Transportation at RPA, chaired the Transportation Focus Group and explored potential transportation improvements and strategies with state, county and local officials. Robert Yaro, Executive Director of RPA, led the Policy Focus Group. This group, comprised of state and local leaders, explored the policy side of implementing the vision, including transfer of development rights and revenue/service-sharing. This report summarizes the results of all of these efforts.

This project is intended to serve as a model for other places in New Jersey and the nation, not only in terms of design principles, but in terms of the process - a process that has brought together, in a creative and cooperative environment, the broadest possible array of civic, government, business, design and technical resource people. The sustainable growth of the New York-New Jersey Metropolitan Region will depend on the success of places such as the Somerset County Regional Center.

This is only the first step for Somerset County and the Regional Center Partnership in a twenty-year process. The public presentation of the results at the end of the workshop initiated what must be an ongoing dialog and outreach effort. The ideas explored here will have meaning if they have the support of the communities, neighborhoods and public and private interests that comprise the Regional Center. By helping the community envision a bright future, a process can be shaped that will ultimately result in a Regional Center where ​“the whole is greater than the sum of its parts”.