The site, which lies between the FBI's under-construction regional headquarters building and the Legal Communications Center, and just across from the NJ Performing Arts center, was sold by PSE&G, the state's largest utility company. Before anything can be done with the land, a former PSE&G maintenance facility and a power substation will have to be demolished and the site remediated. But what Matrix has in mind is substantial.

"We plan to do a mixed-use project that will include market-rate residential, a hotel and offices, depending upon market demand," Richard Johnson Matrix's SVP for development, tells GlobeSt.com. "We are also exploring for-sale residential opportunities--condos--as part of the mix. The site will also have structured parking to support the uses."

The price tag for Matrix's project, whose residential component could add up to as many as 800 units, has been put in the $250-million range. According to Johnson, "we are in the initial stages of concept development. Approvals will probably take the better part of a year, and all phases of the project will be done over a five- to seven-year period.

The residential component will come first, according to Johnson. "Statistics show that 650,000-675,000 people are in Newark every day," he continues. "The city's population is 260,000. That means 400,000 people commute to Newark every day. If you capture just 1%, that's 4,000 residential units. That's one of our goals in the waterfront planning."

And Matrix has yet another major deal in the fire: The company has just signed a contract to buy a nearby vacant site at the key downtown intersection of Raymond Boulevard and McCarter Highway (Route 21). "We are firm on the contract, and we will close soon," says Johnson, who declined to name the seller.

"A prior site plan called for a 22- or 23-story office tower with about 660,000 sf of space," Johnson tells GlobeSt.com. "We are currently evaluating that plan in terms of where the market is now and where we expect it to be.

"The important thing about any waterfront site is that the planning addresses the ability for people to get to the waterfront, and also for the project to relate to the urban grid," Johnson concludes. "We're looking to do the planning of our site, and to the acquisition of the adjacent site, to focus on those type of issues."