Mall of America developer will try to rescue N.J. megamall

By SAMANTHA HENRY, Associated Press

EAST RUTHERFORD, N.J. - Out with Xanadu, in with the American Dream.

Gov. Chris Christie and mall developer Triple Five on Tuesday laid out ambitious new plans for the troubled retail and entertainment project formerly known as Xanadu outside New York City.

Developers say the $2.7 billion megamall, to be renamed American Dream Meadowlands, will attract even more visitors than their other mammoth properties: the Mall of America near Minneapolis and the West Edmonton Mall in Alberta, Canada.

The structure will be expanded to 3 million square feet and filled with shops, restaurants, nightclubs, a 26-screen movie theater and 3,000-seat performing arts theater, indoor glass-domed amusement and water parks, a skating rink and a ski slope with real snow, the developers said.

They'll also make over the hulking, multi-patterned colorful exterior that once prompted Christie to call it the ugliest building in New Jersey.

Located about 10 miles west of New York City in East Rutherford, the structure is visible from the New Jersey Turnpike and is next to the Izod Center. It's across a highway from the $1.6 billion New Meadowlands Stadium that is slated to host the 2014 Super Bowl.

The developers hope to have it ready by then, estimating that renovation of the existing structure will be completed in the fall of 2013, and the expansion, which will include constructing the water and amusement parks, should be completed by 2014.

The never-occupied structure has already had $2 billion poured into it. It was originally projected to open in late 2007 but became mired in delays and legal problems until creditors took it over. Original lead developer Mills Corp. ran into financial problems and was replaced as general managing partner in early 2007 by Los Angeles-based Colony Capital Acquisitions.

Triple Five made a bid to originally develop Xanadu, but the "timing wasn't right," said Paul Ghermezian, senior vice president. The company planned to invest an additional $1.5 billion into the project and replicate the success of their other megamalls.

"It's not just a dream; it's a reality," Ghermezian said. "We've already done it, and we're going to do it again."

The developers hope the mall will generate about $3.5 billion annually for the region and become a tourist destination in itself. They estimate that half the visitors will be local, but they hope to attract tourists on light-rail trains, charter flights or shuttles from nearby Newark Liberty International Airport. With that in mind, the developers will designate places at the mall where travelers can store their luggage while shopping during flight layovers.

The project will generate nearly 9,000 construction jobs and about 35,000 permanent jobs once it's open, a "critical sign New Jersey is making a comeback," Christie said.

He said the state would help finance the project with $200 million in sales tax incentives, but declined to give specifics, saying they were still being finalized.

Critics of the project, including New Jersey Sierra Club Director Jeff Tittel, say the project will cost the state too much money at a time of layoffs and municipal cutbacks and will increase pollution and traffic in an already congested area. Tittel said taxpayers are "getting hit twice" by subsidies and the fact the state isn't getting paid for the land.

Triple Five Chairman Nader Ghermezian countered critics by saying the mall will generate new taxes, and that his projections show that for every dollar spent at the mall, $1.25 will be spent in other parts of New Jersey in the tourism and commerce activity.

(Copyright 2011 by The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved.)

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