New Plans for Garden State Park

A quintessential suburb is getting closer to having something its old-timey neighbors relish - a downtown of its own.

The local planning board Monday night unanimously approved a $500 million project to turn the former Garden State Park horse racing track into a new Main Street-style community of shops, offices, a train station, apartments and single-family homes. Demolition of the race track, which closed last year, could begin by August, developers said.

Cherry Hill and developer Realen Properties have decided to go ahead with the project regardless of the outcome of a coming state Supreme Court decision that could force alterations of the plan.

Fair Share Housing Center Inc., a nonprofit affordable housing advocacy group, told the court earlier this year that the development should include some subsidized housing. It's unclear when there might be a decision.

Planning board attorney Alan S. Zeller said it made sense to approve the plans even without word from the Supreme Court.

"If things broke down, who knows how long that land would sit vacant?" Zeller told the Courier-Post of Cherry Hill for Thursday's editions.

Author: 6 ABC-AP