The City Formerly Known As New Brunswick

In my previous post, A Crucial Vote for the Hub City, about the death of Richard B. Sellars, the one-time head of the New Brunswick, NJ-based Johnson & Johnson and a pivotal voice in keeping the corporation's world headquarters in the Hub City at a time of serious urban and economic decay, I looked (albeit superficially) at the effects of J&J's presence there.

I hinted that now, at a time when builders, retailers, and institutions are once again trending toward urban environs, and transit oriented development becoming a mainstream phrase, that it might be feasible to think that New Brunswick would have been just fine -- eventually -- without the unbelievable physical and cultural sacrifices the city made to accommodate these economic drivers like J&J, Robert Wood Johnson hospital, and Rutgers University. Acres upon acres of historic commercial districts were destroyed for suburban-style "campuses," a hotel, high-end residences, etc. In the picture above, is the foundation of the so-called "Gateway," a tower that will house very high end residences that will connect with the New Brunswick train station, as well as a Barnes & Noble. The Gateway comes at the expense of one of the last 19th-century-era commercial stretches in New Brunswick.

I get it. I get ratables and attracting business and deveopment to improve the economy. On the one hand, these days it's hard to argue with developing dense mixed-use, transit-oriented development. But it all comes at the cost of city history -- one that is now barely evident.

A Crucial Vote for the Hub City

Richard B. Sellars, the former head of Johnson & Johnson died this week at 94. His was a crucial voice in keeping the health care conglomerate in the Hub City, and arguably the reason New Brunswick, NJ is, in fact, known as the "Hub City." Just the second person outside the Johnson family to head J&J, Sellars recognized the company's commitment to its original host city, particularly when company's board of trustees was leaning toward moving the company out of New Brunswick during the city's economic nadir in the 80s; and at a time when businesses and housing were trending toward the suburbs.The New York Times, in its obituary, referenced a 1984 interview with Sellars where he recognized the importance of J&J investing in New Brunswick:

“It was apparent even then that we had a commitment to New Brunswick that we couldn’t run away from,” Mr. Sellars said in a 1984 interview. “The survival of our country depends on the survival of its cities, so we’d all better get involved in cleaning them up.”

Of course, anyone familiar with New Brunswick knows the value of Johnson & Johnson's presence, but also the significant sacrifices the city made at a time when there was little political pressure to preserve the city's historical layout and buildings, as indicated in the picture above. There, the signature IM Pei building in the background and the fallowed land in the foreground that is now home to the Hyatt New Brunswick, were once major commercial districts. The sprawl development that resulted was heralded as urban reinvestment, but it would have looked the same in suburbia. The J&J campus and the Hyatt are colossal wastes of urban land.

These days, there are several major economic drivers in New Brunswick that remain committed to the city, but there continues to be little regard to the city's historic character -- character that was, in part, established by the institutions that remain.