Asbury Park planning director walks council through waterfront redevelopment rules; residents press Main Street vacancies and affordable housing needs

Michelle Alonso, Asbury Park director of planning and redevelopment, gave the City Council a step-by-step presentation on the city's redevelopment process and the specific rules that apply to the waterfront redevelopment area.

Alonso told the council the Waterfront Redevelopment Area has been governed by a redevelopment plan in effect since February 2002 and has been amended over time. She said the plan sets maximum building heights for individual lots (with many interior lot centers capped at three or four stories and many edges capped at eight stories) and a blanket density cap for the waterfront: "no more than 3,164 residential units can be built in the waterfront," she said. Alonso also described a blanket CAFRA (Coastal Area Facility Review Act) permit that applies to the waterfront and said developers east of Memorial Drive proposing more than 24 units must apply to the New Jersey Department of Environmental Protection for CAFRA compliance.

The presentation explained the legal and contractual structure that shapes waterfront projects. Alonso said the city has a long-term redeveloper agreement with a master developer, Asbury Partners, and noted that Asbury Partners has ceded development rights for the boardwalk area to "MAS and Marquette." She said the master redeveloper agreement requires both parties to agree to amendments to the redevelopment plan and that subsequent redevelopers (Toll Brothers, K. Hovnanian, Pulte, and others,…