The application for a 70,000-square-foot warehouse on Route 94 on the Blairstown side of the border with Knowlton was granted a two-year extension last week by the Blairstown Land Use Board.
The project was approved by the board in January of 2024 in the face of opposition from residents and officials of Knowlton Township, which is expected to bear the brunt of the traffic between Interstate 80 and the site.
Most applications of this type are subject to many more layers of approval from county and state agencies. It is generally considered a routine matter to extend municipal approvals while the applications are undergoing subsequent review.
“We’re not ready to proceed yet, but the municipal land use law provides extensions for an application that has been delayed due to outside agency rules,” said Bernd Hefele, an attorney representing developer of the site, Hackensack-based Tritop Realty. “That’s exactly what we have here with this application.
Hefele said final approvals were pending and that a two-year extension would be an adequate amount of time for that.
“We’re just about there,” Hefele said.
Tritop could have requested up to a three-year extension and still could ask for that third year at the expiration of the granted two-year extension, said Land Use Board attorney Roger Thomas. That led to several board members questioning why Tritop didn’t simply ask for a three-year extension to begin with.
Hefele again said they did not expect to need more time. He said the applicants have most of the necessary approvals from the state Department of Environmental Protection, and that approvals from the Department of Transportation are expected “as we speak.”
The project is slated for an 8.9-acre wedge of property that had long been zoned for commercial, and, at the time, Thomas cautioned the board that rejecting the application would likely result in costly litigation with slim chances of winning as the application conformed to existing zoning rules.
Conditions were imposed on Tritop Realty, including a stipulation that the application applies only to warehouse use, and does not include manufacturing and distribution centers. Any use proposed outside that definition would require the applicant to go before the land use board for approval, Thomas said.
The structure could accommodate up to nine separate units, each with an office and a loading dock, reduced from 10 in the original application. Other conditions include the relocation of a driveway, which would eliminate the need for a waiver from the board, and the establishment of a 50-foot buffer between the building and the south property line, which abuts a Knowlton farm.
Knowlton Mayor Debra Shipps had also called for a 100-foot buffer, adding that her municipality would bear a disproportionate burden of traffic from the proposal.
“The majority of the traffic generated by the development will travel through Knowlton Township for approximately 3.5 miles along Route 94 and only for about 250 feet through Blairstown,” Shipps said.
Joe brings decades of journalism experience to the Ridge View Echo, covering everything from local school boards to the U.S. Supreme Court. A former National Law Journal editor and Columbia Law School press officer, he now enjoys telling community stories in Blairstown, where he lives with his wife, Rose, and their two dachshunds.
- Joe Phalon, Contributing Writerhttps://ridgeviewecho.com/author/joe-phalon-contributing-writer/
- Joe Phalon, Contributing Writerhttps://ridgeviewecho.com/author/joe-phalon-contributing-writer/
- Joe Phalon, Contributing Writerhttps://ridgeviewecho.com/author/joe-phalon-contributing-writer/
- Joe Phalon, Contributing Writerhttps://ridgeviewecho.com/author/joe-phalon-contributing-writer/
