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If Subaru’s Camden Developer Supports Multi-Modal Centers, Then What’s Up With This Site Plan?

Subaru of America broke ground this week on its new North American headquarters in Camden, New Jersey. Speakers at the ceremony praised the carmaker for its part in growing Camden’s economy and its promise to create local jobs. Jerry Sweeney, the President, CEO and Trustee of Brandywine Realty Trust, the site’s developer, emphasized a key mission of his company is to build multi-modal, mixed-use town centers, noting Subaru’s role in their creation of a brand new urban town center for Camden.

Photo of current site plans with 1,031 new parking spaces and few pedestrian and bicyclist-focused facilities.
Photo of current site plans with 1,031 new parking spaces and few pedestrian and bicyclist-focused facilities.

And yet, plans that include 1,031 parking spaces for 600 employees remain unchanged since originally (and unanimously) approved by the City of Camden Planning Board in August.

Many of the remarks made at the groundbreaking ceremony emphasized Subaru’s branding as a “unique” automobile company. But what is unique about a “wholly car-oriented” car company headquarters? If anything, this represents a missed opportunity for Subaru to distinguish itself — both as a car company and within the Camden community.

It seems little is being done to connect the 35 percent of Camden households that lack access to a vehicle to new developments such as Subaru’s new site–even though employers relocating to Camden will be hiring local residents, according to New Jersey State Representative Don Norcross. Subaru’s future headquarters also will be only a half-mile from Camden’s largest transit hub and will be near a planned PATCO station on Haddon and Newtown Avenues. But existing site plans featuring excessive surface parking will encourage 1,000 more cars into a city with existing environmental health and traffic safety concerns.

Before this project reaches completion, Subaru of America should look to PanasonicAdobe Systems Incorporated and its own Tokyo-based counterpart for examples of how companies can embrace sustainable transportation and development as part of their brand.

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Joseph
8 years ago

We at South Jersey Urbanists agree. It’s hard to imagine them building a true mixed use development if this is the opening move. I wrote about this on my own blog as well at https://southjerseyist.wordpress.com/2015/08/28/why-new-jersey-taxpayers-118-million-giveaway-to-subaru-wont-revitalize-camden-and-how-theyre-creating-a-problem-that-will-take-decades-to-fix/.

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[…] As more people choose to walk and bike, the manner in which streets are designed must evolve to accommodate this shift in transportation priorities. Seven counties and 123 municipalities in New Jersey have enacted complete streets policies. It’s critical that these complete streets policies are implemented and enforced (and not simply enacted), but it will take perhaps even greater political will to reverse decades of car-oriented development (see Subaru of America’s new Camden headquarters). […]

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