UrbanRenewal wrote:
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jennymayla wrote:
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fashionista422 wrote:
I really think they have done a good job to revamp Jersey City and Liberty Harbor has been a big part of this. I know that every time I pass by (which isn't all the time) there are always new changes and more stores and restaurants popping up.

They are really trying to make Jersey City a nicer, up-and-coming place. It's not going to happen overnight, which I'm sure none of you are saying, but I think we should give them a chance.

New Jersey itself is getting more expensive by the day, so I think condos in Jersey City like Liberty Harbor are going to be more pricey than say, Metuchen, because of the proximity to NYC and all that the area has to offer.

As far as the architecture and walkways, street construction that people are complaining about... it happens, not everything can be the way we all want. For the sake of sounding too corny, we just have to make the best of it and know that what we can't change is not worth wasting our energy complaining about.

Did NYCareerPro send you?

I am conflicted yet again, because I believe your post is a scam but I do want to make one point:

Downtown JC has been developing for years and very successfully. LHN is just a newcomer taking advantage of the momentum. There is nothing wrong with that, just don't credit them with the movement.

I fully agree with jennymayla.

Not to be an attack dog (arf!), but Liberty Harbor North hasn't "revamped" Jersey City -- a place which many have labeled as "up-and-coming" long before LHN's arrival.

It's definitely nice to have LHN along for the ride and I look forward to see what ends up being built over there, but I can safely say that most of us were just fine before Liberty Harbor North broke ground and we'll still be a-okay once the development is completed.

jennymayla wrote:
Quote:

fashionista422 wrote:
I really think they have done a good job to revamp Jersey City and Liberty Harbor has been a big part of this. I know that every time I pass by (which isn't all the time) there are always new changes and more stores and restaurants popping up.

They are really trying to make Jersey City a nicer, up-and-coming place. It's not going to happen overnight, which I'm sure none of you are saying, but I think we should give them a chance.

New Jersey itself is getting more expensive by the day, so I think condos in Jersey City like Liberty Harbor are going to be more pricey than say, Metuchen, because of the proximity to NYC and all that the area has to offer.

As far as the architecture and walkways, street construction that people are complaining about... it happens, not everything can be the way we all want. For the sake of sounding too corny, we just have to make the best of it and know that what we can't change is not worth wasting our energy complaining about.

Did NYCareerPro send you?

I am conflicted yet again, because I believe your post is a scam but I do want to make one point:

Downtown JC has been developing for years and very successfully. LHN is just a newcomer taking advantage of the momentum. There is nothing wrong with that, just don't credit them with the movement.

SalOnTheHill wrote:
Quote:

fashionista422 wrote:
I know that every time I pass by (which isn't all the time) there are always new changes and more stores and restaurants popping up.

Really? Which "stores and restaurants" have popped up so far in Liberty Harbor?

fashionista422 wrote:
I know that every time I pass by (which isn't all the time) there are always new changes and more stores and restaurants popping up.

fashionista422 wrote:
I really think they have done a good job to revamp Jersey City and Liberty Harbor has been a big part of this. I know that every time I pass by (which isn't all the time) there are always new changes and more stores and restaurants popping up.

They are really trying to make Jersey City a nicer, up-and-coming place. It's not going to happen overnight, which I'm sure none of you are saying, but I think we should give them a chance.

New Jersey itself is getting more expensive by the day, so I think condos in Jersey City like Liberty Harbor are going to be more pricey than say, Metuchen, because of the proximity to NYC and all that the area has to offer.

As far as the architecture and walkways, street construction that people are complaining about... it happens, not everything can be the way we all want. For the sake of sounding too corny, we just have to make the best of it and know that what we can't change is not worth wasting our energy complaining about.

fashionista422 wrote:

New Jersey itself is getting more expensive by the day, so I think condos in Jersey City like Liberty Harbor are going to be more pricey than say, Metuchen, because of the proximity to NYC and all that the area has to offer.

fashionista422 wrote:
..so I think condos in Jersey City like Liberty Harbor are going to be more pricey than say, Metuchen...

ianmac47 wrote:
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DanL wrote:
never understood the big deal about "new urbanism" ideas that were used to create a new town in the swamps, being applied to an existing city like Jersey City, a few blocks from direct subway to NYC (less than 10min) and a LRT line, the only benefit has been for it to be stated on the cover sheets of redevelopment plan that are rubber stamped ....

For comparison, one need only look as far as Newport. Mocco's original plans back in the mid 1980s called for a gated community more along the lines of Avalon Cove than the current city.

New Urbanism's importance is mostly a result of a reaction to the high Modern ideals. Mid-century urban planning was heavily influenced by Le Corbusier's plan for Paris.. That is, large open tracks of green space punctuated with high rise residential towers connected by a series of car friendly roadways. Some great examples of this style are Peter Cooper Village / Stuyvesant Town, Chicago's Robert Taylor Homes, and of course, LeFrak City, Queens.

There are a number of key components that Newport shares with these mid 20th century designs that New Urbanism communities like Liberty Harbor North attempt to correct.

First, Newport gives precedence to automobile traffic. New Urbanist ideals call for creating walkable communities. In a city with masst transit, this should seem like an obvious design component. But Newport has both a PATH station and a light rail stop, yet the car is obviously a major factor in the design of the neighborhood. Parking garages dominate Newport's streetscapes. Washignton Boulevard is a major six lane roadway that severs the community in two. Newport is about cars, New Urabnism communities like Liberty Harbor North are about walking and mass transit.

Second, 20th century urban design calls for a delineation between public and private spaces, while New Urbanism emphasizes the public sphere. Newport has a number of gated, private green spaces. The dog park is only for Newport residents and theoretically, so are the playgrounds (though children, unlike dogs do not need to be registered with management).

In essence, Newport creates private enclaves that shut out the general public. Historic urban construction and New Urbanism both seek to create public spaces. The great parks of New York City were largely created as public green spaces. Boston Common was literally a common green space shared by the public. In Newport, even commerce takes place in private spaces -- the mall -- rather than in a traditionally public venue like the street. In Liberty Harbor North, there is no interior mall, but retail accessible from the streets.

Third, New Urbanism strives for a 24 hour a day neighborhood, while Newport segregates shopping, working, and living. 20th Century planning calls for a clear separation of the various components of life. Thus suburban tract homes have sidewalks that go nowhere because there is no place to go-- retail and offices are segregated from residential areas.

The same is true in Newport. Offices line Washignton Blvd. The residences are clustered around Newport Parkway. Retail is contained in the Newport mall. While some of Newport's residential towers have limited retail space, these are mostly services to support the residences, not actual destination retail. Newport is very segmented.

By contrast, Liberty Harbor North has integrated retail, residences, and eventually offices. Its truly a mixed use community with residential units stacked on top of retail, and eventually, next to offices.

Liberty Harbor North could have easily become another Newport. Indeed, it almost became a gated community. But with the New Urbanist ideals, it became a much more traditional urban neighborhood, which is ultimately the whole point of New Urbanism.

That said, there are a few criticisms I have of Newport. First, the streets are too wide. The current streets have a huge distance between the base of the buildings on either side, and enough room for a gentle curve to the street while keeping the building line straight. The problem I have with this is that the great urban neighborhoods of the world have narrow streets. Look at the old quarter in Rome, the west village in New york, or colonial Boston. Even in Jersey City most of the historic streets are more narrow than those in Liberty Harbor.

Second, some of the architectural choices have me baffled. Specifically, some of the 'brownstone' units have rather oversized white railings, which look like they belong to a suburban McMansion rather than an urban brownstone. Further, while I understand they were trying to artificially create the sense of an organic city with a varied architectural style, it is both too much and not enough at the same time. That is, some of the designs repeat on the different streets-- meaning there is not enough variety in the building shapes.

At the same time, historic districts, especially brownstone districts, tend to have much less variety in design on each block than LHN has. That is, organic cities tend to be built at at the same time and in a similar style, block by block. While many of the historic blocks have slight variations in each house, most have common traits. LHN is so wildly varied that the houses simply look incongruous next to each other.

groovlstk wrote:

It may be a great walk to Exchange on a pleasant morning from LHN, but if you have to make that walk every night in the Winter it's not much fun... I did it for years from Essex & Warren St. and on cold days w/the always heavy winds it can be surprisingly difficult.

groovlstk wrote:
Quote:

jennymayla wrote:

While I reject this thread since it is all based on FRAUD, I still want to respond...

LHN is a casual walk to the Grove PATH station. Like 8 minutes tops. Plus on a nice day, it's a great walk to the Exchange PATH. And what's wrong with having to take the light rail if you don't feel like walking?

As for the neighborhood, it is literally across the street from an already-booming neighborhood called Van Vorst Park, and it borders another booming neighborhood called Paulus Hook.

Okay, so some of the new fancytown elements of LHN might be under construction for a while, but it's incorrect to position it like it's in the boonies or an underdeveloped location.

I have heard similar complaints about the sales people though. Lots of people have been turned off by them, which is a shame.

While I didn't mean to imply that LHN was in the boonies, it is too isolated for my tastes at $500k+ for a 1BR unit.

It may be a great walk to Exchange on a pleasant morning from LHN, but if you have to make that walk every night in the Winter it's not much fun... I did it for years from Essex & Warren St. and on cold days w/the always heavy winds it can be surprisingly difficult. Many such nights I had to stop for relief, in the form of a glass of Jameson's, at the Light Horse, otherwise I'd have never made it home

I've commuted into Manhattan from the burbs (car to park & ride, bus to Port Authority, subway to office), from the Heights (99s or marshrutka to Port Authority, subway to office), and for the last 9 years from Paulus Hook (PATH to WTC and more recently, PATH to 33rd). I love to bitch about the PATH, but over this time I've become strongly averse to having to rely on more than one form of transportation - in addition to the PATH - to get to and from work. Yeah, probably I'm a bit anal about it but I've spent too much of my life on buses, broken down jitneys, and subway platforms and there are just too many ways to be delayed when you add another link to your commute.

jennymayla wrote:

While I reject this thread since it is all based on FRAUD, I still want to respond...

LHN is a casual walk to the Grove PATH station. Like 8 minutes tops. Plus on a nice day, it's a great walk to the Exchange PATH. And what's wrong with having to take the light rail if you don't feel like walking?

As for the neighborhood, it is literally across the street from an already-booming neighborhood called Van Vorst Park, and it borders another booming neighborhood called Paulus Hook.

Okay, so some of the new fancytown elements of LHN might be under construction for a while, but it's incorrect to position it like it's in the boonies or an underdeveloped location.

I have heard similar complaints about the sales people though. Lots of people have been turned off by them, which is a shame.

nycareerpro wrote:
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ianmac47 wrote:
Quote:

nycareerpro wrote:
I have looked at Liberty Harbor a few times and really fell in love with it. It does have tons of amenities and is very technologically advanced for a decent price. I am just waiting for my lease to be up to move in there! The sales people were quite friendly to me, but they are very busy! It is definitely worth it though. Anyone else live there now that has any more comments on these condos in Jersey City? Thanks!

Liberty Harbor

Hmm, a post talking about how great the sales people are.

And a whole new thread talking about the great security.

And a link to the Liberty Harbor website.

Do you smell something? Because I think I smell a big steamy pile of shilling.

I only linked the website so that people knew where to go to find it if they didn't already know- it only takes two seconds to link so I didn't see it as a big deal. And like I posted earlier, I don't have a lot of time to go around a look at places since I work a lot and have a far commute into the city. These condos would be really convenient for me and I wanted responses of the pros and cons so I didn't go into the decision too blindly.

nycareerpro wrote: And like I posted earlier, I don't have a lot of time to go around a look at places since I work a lot and have a far commute into the city.

DanL wrote:
never understood the big deal about "new urbanism" ideas that were used to create a new town in the swamps, being applied to an existing city like Jersey City, a few blocks from direct subway to NYC (less than 10min) and a LRT line, the only benefit has been for it to be stated on the cover sheets of redevelopment plan that are rubber stamped ....

The sales people were quite friendly to me, but they are very busy!

ianmac47 wrote:
Quote:

nycareerpro wrote:
I have looked at Liberty Harbor a few times and really fell in love with it. It does have tons of amenities and is very technologically advanced for a decent price. I am just waiting for my lease to be up to move in there! The sales people were quite friendly to me, but they are very busy! It is definitely worth it though. Anyone else live there now that has any more comments on these condos in Jersey City? Thanks!

Liberty Harbor

Hmm, a post talking about how great the sales people are.

And a whole new thread talking about the great security.

And a link to the Liberty Harbor website.

Do you smell something? Because I think I smell a big steamy pile of shilling.

jennymayla wrote:
Quote:

groovlstk wrote:
Quote:

nycareerpro wrote:
I have looked at Liberty Harbor a few times and really fell in love with it. It does have tons of amenities and is very technologically advanced for a decent price. I am just waiting for my lease to be up to move in there! The sales people were quite friendly to me, but they are very busy! It is definitely worth it though. Anyone else live there now that has any more comments on these condos in Jersey City? Thanks!

Liberty Harbor

$1/2 million for a 1BR is a "decent price" in a neighborhood that is certainly up and coming but will be years before arrival? Plus it's more than a stroll to the Grove PATH and you'd have to rely on the light rail to get to Exchange - unless you use the Turnpike each day to commute, it's hardly as convenient as lower-priced options east.

My wife and I looked at LHN and it was impressive. I particularly loved the building facades and technology, but the two 1BRs we looked at (last Spring) were $505k and $510k. Too much, too far, and too many pushy salespeople and the on-site financier guy was greasier than a fried funnel cake fried in fried oil at Great Adventure on a hot day.

While I reject this thread since it is all based on FRAUD, I still want to respond...

LHN is a casual walk to the Grove PATH station. Like 8 minutes tops. Plus on a nice day, it's a great walk to the Exchange PATH. And what's wrong with having to take the light rail if you don't feel like walking?

As for the neighborhood, it is literally across the street from an already-booming neighborhood called Van Vorst Park, and it borders another booming neighborhood called Paulus Hook.

Okay, so some of the new fancytown elements of LHN might be under construction for a while, but it's incorrect to position it like it's in the boonies or an underdeveloped location.

I have heard similar complaints about the sales people though. Lots of people have been turned off by them, which is a shame.

ianmac47 wrote:

Not exactly. Gulls Cove is not owned by Mocco now, but he did own the land before selling it to Metro Homes, with deeded restrictions requiring they adhere to the master plan created by Duany Plater Zyberk. This is different than the other redevelopment zones.

Also, "Liberty Harbor" was originally a plan to build high rise residential towers in what is now Liberty State Park, Le Corbusier style.

ianmac47 wrote:
Technically, Gull's Cove is part of Liberty Harbor North. The masterplan by DPZ includes everything between Jersey Avenue and Van Vorst Street. The portion that is commonly referred to as Liberty Harbor North, and which is accessible from Liberty Harbor .com is being built by Peter Mocco, but the res of the lots, such as those around Gulls Cove, must conform to the LHN masterplan created by DPZ. This is similar to another DPZ community, the much lauded Seaside Florida. DPZ created what amounted to city zoning ordinances, and most of the properties were eventually built on by private owners, conforming to the masterplan.

ianmac47 wrote:
Quote:

SalOnTheHill wrote:
There's the Liberty Harbor North Redevelopment Plan, and then there is "Liberty Harbor", the Mocco-owned development comprising a large percentage of the LHN Redevelopment Plan.

So while Gull's Cove is not a part of the development named Liberty Harbor (the Northern-most portions of which abut Grand Street, this phase commonly being referred to as Liberty Harbor North), it lies within the Redevelopment Plan of the same name.

Not exactly. Gulls Cove is not owned by Mocco now, but he did own the land before selling it to Metro Homes, with deeded restrictions requiring they adhere to the master plan created by Duany Plater Zyberk. This is different than the other redevelopment zones.

Also, "Liberty Harbor" was originally a plan to build high rise residential towers in what is now Liberty State Park, Le Corbusier style.

SalOnTheHill wrote:
There's the Liberty Harbor North Redevelopment Plan, and then there is "Liberty Harbor", the Mocco-owned development comprising a large percentage of the LHN Redevelopment Plan.

So while Gull's Cove is not a part of the development named Liberty Harbor (the Northern-most portions of which abut Grand Street, this phase commonly being referred to as Liberty Harbor North), it lies within the Redevelopment Plan of the same name.

ianmac47 wrote:
Technically, Gull's Cove is part of Liberty Harbor North. The masterplan by DPZ includes everything between Jersey Avenue and Van Vorst Street. The portion that is commonly referred to as Liberty Harbor North, and which is accessible from Liberty Harbor .com is being built by Peter Mocco, but the res of the lots, such as those around Gulls Cove, must conform to the LHN masterplan created by DPZ. This is similar to another DPZ community, the much lauded Seaside Florida. DPZ created what amounted to city zoning ordinances, and most of the properties were eventually built on by private owners, conforming to the masterplan.

jennymayla wrote:
Quote:

groovlstk wrote:
Quote:

nycareerpro wrote:
I have looked at Liberty Harbor a few times and really fell in love with it. It does have tons of amenities and is very technologically advanced for a decent price. I am just waiting for my lease to be up to move in there! The sales people were quite friendly to me, but they are very busy! It is definitely worth it though. Anyone else live there now that has any more comments on these condos in Jersey City? Thanks!

Liberty Harbor

$1/2 million for a 1BR is a "decent price" in a neighborhood that is certainly up and coming but will be years before arrival? Plus it's more than a stroll to the Grove PATH and you'd have to rely on the light rail to get to Exchange - unless you use the Turnpike each day to commute, it's hardly as convenient as lower-priced options east.

My wife and I looked at LHN and it was impressive. I particularly loved the building facades and technology, but the two 1BRs we looked at (last Spring) were $505k and $510k. Too much, too far, and too many pushy salespeople and the on-site financier guy was greasier than a fried funnel cake fried in fried oil at Great Adventure on a hot day.

While I reject this thread since it is all based on FRAUD, I still want to respond...

LHN is a casual walk to the Grove PATH station. Like 8 minutes tops. Plus on a nice day, it's a great walk to the Exchange PATH. And what's wrong with having to take the light rail if you don't feel like walking?

As for the neighborhood, it is literally across the street from an already-booming neighborhood called Van Vorst Park, and it borders another booming neighborhood called Paulus Hook.

Okay, so some of the new fancytown elements of LHN might be under construction for a while, but it's incorrect to position it like it's in the boonies or an underdeveloped location.

I have heard similar complaints about the sales people though. Lots of people have been turned off by them, which is a shame.

groovlstk wrote:
Quote:

nycareerpro wrote:
I have looked at Liberty Harbor a few times and really fell in love with it. It does have tons of amenities and is very technologically advanced for a decent price. I am just waiting for my lease to be up to move in there! The sales people were quite friendly to me, but they are very busy! It is definitely worth it though. Anyone else live there now that has any more comments on these condos in Jersey City? Thanks!

Liberty Harbor

$1/2 million for a 1BR is a "decent price" in a neighborhood that is certainly up and coming but will be years before arrival? Plus it's more than a stroll to the Grove PATH and you'd have to rely on the light rail to get to Exchange - unless you use the Turnpike each day to commute, it's hardly as convenient as lower-priced options east.

My wife and I looked at LHN and it was impressive. I particularly loved the building facades and technology, but the two 1BRs we looked at (last Spring) were $505k and $510k. Too much, too far, and too many pushy salespeople and the on-site financier guy was greasier than a fried funnel cake fried in fried oil at Great Adventure on a hot day.