November 27, 2023
Jersey City has a habit of reinventing itself one neighborhood at a time. Much of that progress traces back to developers willing to bet on a stretch of land before anyone else saw its potential, and each success tends to spark the next one. That pattern is playing out again with Westview, a major new project taking shape in Jersey City’s West Side.
How Jersey City Keeps Reinventing Itself
The story starts in the mid-1980s, when LeFrak set its sights on a quiet stretch of Jersey City waterfront. That bet became Newport, and it didn’t just transform one site. It reshaped Downtown Jersey City into the bustling community it is today, with countless developers following LeFrak’s lead in the decades since.
Journal Square followed a similar arc. Once the heart of Jersey City, the neighborhood spent years hearing promises of a comeback from local officials and real estate speculators. Those promises finally took shape in 2016, when KRE Group broke ground on the first Journal Squared tower. Just a few years later, Journal Square is home to one of the largest development booms anywhere in New Jersey.
Now a new chapter is opening on the West Side.
What Is Westview?
Westview is a multi-phase, mixed-use development currently in pre-development planning for Jersey City’s West Side. Led by Bushburg, a developer known for transformative adaptive reuse projects across New York, New Jersey, and Florida, Westview aims to do for the West Side what Newport did for the waterfront and Journal Squared is doing for the Square.
The plan calls for three mixed-use, high-rise structures blending residential living with commercial space, built across a series of lots spanning roughly 8.29 acres. The irregularly shaped parcel touches Route 440, Culver Avenue, Mallory Avenue, Pollack Avenue, Claremont Avenue, and Water Street. Most of the land sits vacant today, aside from one parcel with an existing building.
The Team Behind the Vision
Turning an irregular, mixed-zoning site like this into a cohesive neighborhood takes the right planning partners. Bushburg brought in Dresdner Robin, a land use planning firm with deep Jersey City experience, having advised on Journal Squared, Berry Lane Park, NJCU’s Performing Arts Center, 99 Hudson, and more. MHS Architecture, one of the area’s most prominent firms, is designing the project.
The site’s diverse zoning, which includes both High-Rise and Mid-Rise B Zones, gives the team flexibility to mix building types, densities, and uses across the three planned phases. Bushburg is also working with Genova Burns for legal counsel and GRID Real Estate as redevelopment advisor, rounding out a team built to navigate a project of this scale.
What Westview Will Include
Once complete, Westview is planned to bring more than 3,000 residential units to the West Side, along with nearly 130,000 square feet of retail space and 120,000 square feet of park space. The plans also include around 2,000 vehicle parking spaces and 1,695 bicycle parking spots, reflecting a design that supports both drivers and cyclists.
One of the more interesting design decisions involves the right of way for the planned Hudson-Bergen Light Rail extension, which runs through the Westview property. Rather than treating that corridor as a constraint, planners turned it into an opportunity, designing large-scale public park space underneath and alongside the future rail line. Once built, the HBLR extension will connect Westview directly to the rest of Jersey City, Hoboken, and NYC transit.
Building a Self-Sufficient Neighborhood
Westview is being planned as a community that stands on its own while staying closely tied to the rest of the city. The significant retail component is designed to draw in businesses of all sizes, from everyday necessities to local restaurants and shops. The goal is a neighborhood where residents can find what they need close to home while still feeling connected to Jersey City at large, a mix of daily convenience and community that fosters real connection among neighbors.
Why This Project Matters
Projects on this scale never move forward on vision alone. Westview will need continued support from the community and elected officials to move from planning to reality, just as Newport and Journal Squared did before it. If the pattern holds, Westview could become the next neighborhood that redefines what’s possible on Jersey City’s West Side.
GRID Real Estate is proud to serve as redevelopment advisor on Westview, working alongside Bushburg, Dresdner Robin, MHS Architecture, and Genova Burns to help bring this vision to life.
