Jersey City officials are awaiting a decision by the Environmental Protection Agency that could remove a notorious landfill from its list of Superfund cleanup sites, a decision that could clear the way for a city park to be built where underground fires burned for nearly three decades.
According to the
Newark Star-Ledger, half of the 32-acre site has been cleared of pollutants that caused the fires and if the city has it way the old dump will be turned into the Skyway Riverfront Park. City officials have plans to build a pedestrian bridge as well to connect the park, which would be the city's largest, to an expanded waterfront walkway on the town's western border.
The state has already awarded Jersey City and Hudson County $800,000 in grants to help fund the park, which originally was supposed to cost about $10 million. But that figure has been cut by half because of budget considerations.
Jersey City Mayor Jerramiah Healy said the transformation of the landfill to green space has been remarkable.
“You used to see the fires, the dump. Now you see nothing but green, open space," he told the Star-Ledger.
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