Local investment group looks west to Burlington City
Ten properties are under contract in area set for redevelopment
A group of Asbury Park entrepreneurs have set their sights on a new horizon, this time along the Delaware River.
The Philadelphia Inquirer reports Smith, a partnership between Knockout design group and Watt Architects, are under contract to purchase ten buildings in Burlington City, an historic town situated about 20 miles north of Philadelphia ripe for revival.
Burlington City’s current aesthetic is reminiscent of Asbury Park around the time Smith arrived and began opening restaurants seven years ago. The Inquirer calls it “now a depressed community with many vacant storefronts and several boarded-up homes.”
With Trenton and Philadelphia close by, a light rail system already in place, and government subsidies in place for areas zoned for redevelopment, the group will now extend its business ventures to the blue-collar Philadelphia suburb whose population is just under 10,000 people.
“Burlington City is a beautiful little city that is in need of restoration, it reminds me very much of Asbury Park,” said Jim Watt, an architect and one of five owners of Smith, in an interview with the Sun.
Smith are the proprietors of five Asbury Park restaurants, Porta [shown above], Brickwall, The Annex, the relatively new Goldie’s vegan restaurant, and soon-to-open Pasquale and Sabine, a French brasserie. The group also owns the old gas company building at 601 Bangs Ave. Pascal and Sabine, the French restaurant, just weeks away from opening, will operate on the ground floor of the building, with condos on the upper floors and office space in between. The Sun’s parent publication, triCityNews, is a long time tenant of the building.
With four successful restaurants already in operation in Asbury Park and one more on the horizon, the group will now test its successful Asbury Park business model on the west side of the state.
Commercial properties account for three of the structures under contract in Burlington. Plans for those spaces include another Porta, a Brickwall type tavern restaurant and a coffee shop, according to Watt.
Porta’s Asbury Park location received rave reviews in the New York Times’ food section in July. Two more locations are slated for the popular, atypical Italian-style family restaurant that operates as a dance club on the weekends, one in Jersey City and a smaller version in Newark.
The seven properties that remain are residential. One of the homes will be Watt’s primary residence, he said. Several of his business partners will also make a move to the location.
“We fell in love with Burlington the same way we fell in love with Asbury Park and we want to participate in its revitalization,” he said.
The Inquirer also reports Watt’s group intends to invest 20 million in their Burlington City redevelopment efforts, but Watt says that information is not true.
“We have no idea how much we are investing at this point, because we’ve just started,” he said.
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