Abandoned Brunswick Avenue Site May Get A Makeover, Officials Say

LAWRENCE, NJ - A long-abandoned commercial property on Brunswick Avenue is being eyed for a makeover, Lawrence officials said.

Lawrence officials will be using a grant from the NJDEP and EDA from the Hazardous Discharge Site Remediation Fund (HDSRF) to investigate how the former site of Kraft Cleaners at 1840 Brunswick Avenue site, which has been vacant for at least a decade, can be used in the future, officials said Friday.

Plans include a probe into the current status of the site, as well as research into additional grants to revamp the property.

Work is slated to begin instantaneously. From Aug. 8 to 11, a team from Langan Engineering and Environmental Services will start fieldwork to conduct the investigation and evaluate soil or groundwater contamination.

The first phase also includes installation of monitoring wells for groundwater sampling, officials said.

“As you may recall, this project is similar to the the Pit Stop location on Lawrence Road,” the township said. “The Township does NOT own either of these properties, but we have identified them as dilapidated sites and are doing our best to address them meaningfully using grant funding in order to maintain the quality of life in Lawrence Township.”

Work on the site has been a long time coming. According to township records, plans to assess the abandoned site for demolition were discussed at a council meeting in June 2011. The building on the site was torn down a short time later.

Per the 2011 meeting minutes, the council noted that “numerous” notices had been sent for years to the property owners of the site from local construction and health departments, to no avail. Officials even threatened property owners at one point with a lawsuit.

The lot has been owned by Pintov Equities, an LLC based in Lakewood, since 2007, according to public records. The land was last assessed for $81,000 in 2023 and costs Pintov Equities about $2,383 in taxes annually.