Real
estate brokers have long described New Jersey’s gold coast, stretching
from Jersey City to Weehawken, as the sixth borough of New York City,
where apartments offer the best views of the Empire State Building.
But
now Paul Fireman, the billionaire who built one of the world’s most
expensive golf courses in Jersey City on top of a toxic dump, is
challenging the notion that the gold coast should play second fiddle to
New York.
Mr.
Fireman, the founder and former chairman of Reebok International, is
proposing a $4.6 billion project, including a 95-story skyscraper,
adjoining his 160-acre golf course on the Hudson River, at the south end
of Jersey City.
Mr.
Fireman appears to have thrown a greatest hits of unbuilt projects into
a blender — Donald J. Trump’s plan for a Nascar racetrack on Staten
Island, a giant Ferris wheel in the New Jersey Meadowlands — with one of
the super towers from Manhattan’s emerging Billionaire’s Row and a
dollop of gambling to spice it up.
Known
as Liberty Rising, the tower would include a casino, a hotel and
apartments, along with expensive shops and an entertainment complex.
There are also plans for what would be the world’s largest Ferris wheel
and a 107,500-seat stadium for motor sports. The proposed complex was
first reported on Wednesday by The Star-Ledger of Newark.
The tower would presumably be as tall or taller than 1 World Trade Center, now the tallest skyscraper in the Western Hemisphere. It would loom over the Statue of Liberty and offer panoramic views of the harbor, Lower Manhattan and New Jersey.
“You’ve
got to think big,” said Mayor Steven Fulop of Jersey City, adding that
he had been discussing the project with Mr. Fireman for eight months.
“The opportunity to have a world-class facility on the waterfront is
significant from a job-creation standpoint, for tax relief and for
tourism. Paul Fireman is capable of executing something like this.”
Mr.
Fireman spent $250 million cleaning up the Jersey City dump site and
building the Liberty National Golf Course while still running Reebok.
The course opened in 2006. It had an initiation fee of $500,000 and
attracted players that included Wall Street titans, who could reach the
course by ferry from Lower Manhattan, and Giants quarterback Eli
Manning.
Mr.
Fireman, who did not return calls seeking comment about his new
project, has been meeting with elected officials across the state.
One
reason for his lobbying is that a casino outside Atlantic City would
require an amendment to the State Constitution and a referendum. Until
now, Gov. Chris Christie
has resisted calls for casinos in North Jersey, preferring to focus on
reviving Atlantic City, where gambling revenues have been in a tailspin
since 2006.
But
the prospect that gamblers from the state’s prosperous northern
communities would go to Las Vegas-style casinos being planned in New
York State has New Jersey legislators suddenly rethinking their
strategy.
With
12 million adults within an hour of the Fireman site, Mr. Fulop said
projections indicated “it would be the highest-grossing casino in the
United States — we’re targeting the New York market.”
Mayor Fulop brushed aside fears that a casino-resort in Jersey City would undermine the 11 casinos in Atlantic City.
But
not everyone is convinced that the site, a somewhat isolated area south
of Liberty State Park and the Liberty Science Center, is an ideal
location for ultra-expensive apartments or a luxury hotel.
“Not
to criticize Jersey City, but it’s tough to create a luxury residential
product outside of a hub like Manhattan,” said Jonathan J. Miller,
president of Miller Samuel, an appraisal firm in Manhattan. “The trophy
market isn’t simply about building something big and sticking it
somewhere.
“I
don’t understand this location, even if the views are spectacular. It’s
aligned with things that don’t go together with high-end apartments,
like motor cross.”
Mr. Fulop is not so sure about motor cross either, because of the potential increased traffic through Liberty State Park.
But
with a 95-story tower, a megacasino and a proposed stadium that seats
nearly 25,000 more people than MetLife Stadium, the project is drowning
in superlatives. Mr. Fulop said the $4.6 billion complex would be “one
of the biggest construction projects in the U.S.”
Well, it would be about as big as the Atlantic Yards
development in Brooklyn, but a fraction of the size of the $20 billion
Hudson Yards project underway on the Far West Side of Manhattan.
“We’re
talking about a transformational project,” said Bill Pascrell III, a
lobbyist for Mr. Fireman’s project. “It will accentuate the true value
of the gold coast and take advantage of a tremendous city, and maybe
give something for New Yorkers to look at, instead of us looking at the
magical city of New York.”A casino in Jersey City? Venture capitalist wants to make it happen
The former head of Reebok has been quietly shopping around
plans to build a massive casino and entertainment complex in Jersey
City, shown in this 2011 file photo
(Frances Micklow/The Star-Ledger)
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on July 08, 2014 at 8:21 PM, updated July 09, 2014 at 11:03 AM
The $4.6 billion project would also feature residences, a 107,500-seat motor sports stadium and what is billed as the largest Ferris wheel in the world.
But there’s one catch — it would not be in Atlantic City, the only city where New Jersey has allowed gambling since its legalization almost 40 years ago. Rather, it would rise in Jersey City, with sweeping views of Manhattan and sit almost eyeball to eyeball with the new 104-story World Trade Center just across the harbor.
"I’m excited about the potential for a world-class facility that includes a casino, hotel and convention center as well as the largest ferris wheel in the world all located next to the best park in New Jersey," Mayor Steve Fulop said. "I still need more information regarding the racetrack to be confident it will not harm Liberty State Park. This development would create 25,000 jobs and over $5 billion of investment, which would be one of the largest construction projects in the United States."
Even a former mayor of Atlantic City, state Sen. Jim Whelan (D-Atlantic), accepted the inevitability of the project, or one like it.
"I’m sure there are a lot of people who will take me to task for daring to even consider casinos outside of Atlantic City," Whelan said. "I’d love to be wrong, but I think that’s the reality of where we are."
The man behind the proposal is Paul Fireman, a former chief executive of Reebok who runs Fireman Capital Partners in Boston, and whose wealth Forbes placed in 2006 at $1.1 billion.
Fireman has met with several lawmakers about his proposal, according to two who provided details to The Star-Ledger. But Fireman himself did not return calls and emails seeking comment.
"It’s huge," said state Sen. Raymond Lesniak (D-Union), who has met with Fireman. "It has the wow factor ... It will blow away Macau as a destination place for gaming."
According to the lawmakers, the casino would be situated near the waterfront, next to the Liberty National Golf Course, which Fireman built in 2006.
Assemblyman Ralph Caputo (D-Essex), a former casino executive and chairman of the Assembly Tourism, Gaming and Arts Committee, said he, too, had discussed the project with Fireman.
"When companies or investors lay out a... plan like that — an expensive, massive project — it very possibly can work," Caputo said.
The proposal is in its infancy, and many of the details — including how it would connect with NJ Transit’s nearby light rail system — were not available. But mega projects — like the trouble-plagued American Dream, formerly known as Xanadu — often don’t end up as originally planned, if at all.
Then there’s the huge obstacle in its path: Opening a casino anywhere outside Atlantic City would require the approval of New Jersey voters to amend the state constitution.
In 2011, Gov. Chris Christie and lawmakers put a five-year plan in place to revive Atlantic City, which began hemorrhaging profits once casinos started opening in neighboring states. And despite an infusion of money from the state, the resort is still struggling, with two casinos closing their doors so far this year and another filing for bankruptcy.
Christie and Senate President Stephen Sweeney (D-Gloucester), after years steadfastly refusing to allow casino gambling anywhere else in the state, are starting to relent.
Sweeney said last week he was willing to consider putting forth a constitutional amendment for voters to approve to allow gambling elsewhere in the state 2015 — as long as it included a way to help Atlantic City.
For his part, Christie said last week he was "happy to have that conversation" with Sweeney.
While Sweeney declined to comment specifically on the Jersey City proposal, he did say that "if we’re going to look at opening (gambling) up, it could be in Jersey City or somewhere else up north where a casino could be beneficial."
Whelan, the former Atlantic City mayor, said he would like future legislation to require any new North Jersey casino operators to also open a casino in Atlantic City, restrict the gaming expansion only to North Jersey, and to make sure revenue makes its way south in the same way that Atlantic City casinos funded projects around the state for years.
Until now, those in favor of expanding gambling into North Jersey have generally wanted to build a casino in the Meadowlands. Lesniak said he would still like to see that to happen, though it would serve a different market.
"The Meadowlands would co-exist," he said. "They really would have two separate attractions. The Meadowlands would be more of an average day player, whereas this would attract the high rollers from around the world."
He said up to $1 billion in revenue from two casinos over 10 years would be devoted to transforming Atlantic City from a past-its-prime gambling mecca into an all-around tourist destination. Lesniak added that the Jersey City proposal, like any other casino proposed outside of Atlantic City casino, would have to compete for a license under the terms laid out in future legislation.
"There’s a lot invested in Atlantic City," Lesniak said, "and rather than this proposal leaving it high and dry, it actually is a means for it to be saved."
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