April 1998

Making a Deal with the Devils

The proposed sports arena would be built over the NJ Transit bus terminal, PATH Station and the train sheds which are part of the Historic Site designation of the Hoboken Terminal

Hoboken Mayor Anthony Russo and New Jersey Devils' owner John McMullen made public their plans to build a $175 million sports arena and entertainment center atop the historic Erie Lackawana Train Terminal in a news conference on December 19, 1997. In addition to a 20,000-seat arena, this colossus would include a 20-screen multiplex cinema, 200,000 square feet of commercial space and a 4,000- to 5,000- car parking garage in Jersey City. McMullen announced that he planned to move his hockey team from the Meadowlands to Hoboken and has begun talking to the owner of the New Jersey Nets about sharing this new facility. Besides sporting events, the arena would host trade shows and rock concerts. The New Jersey Devils' owner has been developing this plan with City officials in Hoboken over the past three to four years.

"We cannot survive in the Continental Arena," McMullen exclaimed in a New York Daily News article on Sunday, March 1. He called this arena "antiquated" with its lack of executive suites and retail space. McMullen is a leaseholder at the Meadowlands.

City officials claimed that a traffic analysis showed that this is a sound idea. The study, paid for by the New Jersey Devils' owner, forecast that between 30 and 50 percent of those coming to the complex for a game -- 6,000 to 10,000 people -- would come by car, with the rest using mass transit. Mayor Russo ended the press conference abruptly when reporters began asking questions about the arena's impact on the quality of life in Hoboken.

Drawings of the sports and entertainment complex depict a gargantuan structure resembling an airplane hanger stretching from Hudson Place in Hoboken to 18th Street in Jersey City. It would completely cover the bus terminal above the Hoboken Path Station, the train shed at the Erie Lackawana Terminal and the long canal south of the train tracks. The terminal building, which is listed on the Federal Register of Historic Sites, would be engulfed by this structure.