Maplewood Township and Short Hills set within Millburn Township are located in Essex County while the City of Summit is located in Union County
In Maplewood Township the median resident age is 38 years old and the median household income is $79,637. 50.8 percent of the residents over 25 have bachelor’s degrees and 22 percent have professional or graduate degrees. The main industries providing employment in and around Maplewood are educational, health and social services (22.9%), professional, scientific, management, administrative and waste management services (17.1%) and finance, insurance, real estate (11.8%). The local unemployment rate stands at 3.9%.
Essex County is New Jersey's second most populous County. It is home to over nine percent of the state's population and supplies almost nine percent of New Jersey's civilian labor force. Since its inception it has been the industrial and financial hub of New Jersey. Countywide, total real property values now exceed $36 billion with an annual growth in 1996 of $78 million.
Some of the state's largest corporations are located here including AT&T, Bell Atlantic, Automatic Data Processing (ADP) and Hoffmann-La Roche. Headquartered in Newark are Prudential Insurance, Blue Cross and Blue Shield of New Jersey, New Jersey Transit and Public Service Electric & Gas Co. (PSE&G).
Two of the New York-New Jersey Metropolitan Region’s major transportation centers lie partly within Newark's boundaries --- Newark International Airport and the Port Newark/Elizabeth Marine Terminal. Newark International Airport has continued to grow in both passenger and cargo traffic at a time when the region's other two major airports, JFK International and LaGuardia International (both located in New York City), experienced stable or declining traffic volumes.
Minutes from the airport, Port Newark/Elizabeth is one of the most active ports in the nation and features one of the largest container shipping complexes in the world. The largest Foreign Trade Zone in the United States is located here. These facilities have contributed to the county becoming the major transportation hub in the northeastern US.
Short Hills has a median population age that is approximately 39 years old. The median household income here is quite high here at $130,848 compared with the rest of the state, as well as nationally. Over 2400 of the households in Millburn-Short Hills report household incomes in excess of $200,000. Almost 80 percent of the households are families with children. 74% of the population 25 and older have bachelor degrees while 38% have professional or graduate degrees. 87% work in white-collar jobs. Much of the working population commutes into Manhattan or nearby Newark. The average commute time is 34 minutes. Unemployment is reported at 1.8 percent.
The Mall at Short Hills, located in the northwest corner of the Township, is a nationally famous regional shopping center with more than 170 fine shops, restaurants and department stores including branches of Bloomingdale's, Saks Fifth Avenue, Neiman Marcus, Nordstrom and Macy's. More than 1000 businesses and professionals are located in the Township. The community is also home to a $50 million Five Diamond Hotel and Office complex opposite the Mall. The 240,000 square foot office complex with a 300-room Hilton Hotel with conference and banquet facilities opened in 1988.
The average age of the city of Summit resident is 37 years old with an average household income of $92,964. 61.6% percent of adults over 25 have bachelor’s degrees and 30% have professional or graduate degrees. 2.5% report themselves as unemployed. The principal industries providing employment are finance, insurance, and real estate (19.6%), educational, health and social services (18.1%), professional, scientific, management, administrative, and waste management services (16.4%), and manufacturing (10.6%). The major employers in Union County are Merck, Schering-Plough, Federal Express, Overlook Hospital, Trinitas Hospital, and General Motors.
Maplewood’s Springfield Avenue is the central shopping street. The Springfield Avenue Partnership is the District Management Corporation of the Springfield Avenue. The Partnership was originally a group of neighborhood citizens who wanted to revitalize the main shopping corridor. It is now a 501 (c) (3) non-profit corporation and is governed by a board of trustees made up of business and property owners, local residents and municipal officials. The partnership is the manager of the Springfield Avenue Special Improvement District (SID). This was established with the goal of creating a stable, diverse and friendly commercial district that provides for the needs of the local community and brings new visitors to the shopping district.
The Partnership creates, sponsors and coordinates marketing and promotional events for the Springfield Avenue business district. These efforts promote the business district to the local community and help create a favorable environment for new businesses to locate. The Partnership also performs a variety of supplemental services such as sidewalk cleaning, conducting workshops, publishing a business directory, maintaining a database of available commercial space, publishing a newsletter and assisting with façade renovation projects.
In 2003 more than a dozen new businesses, providing goods and services were welcomed to Springfield Avenue. There are now over 20 food related businesses, ranging from French to Caribbean cuisine and there are plans to construct new retail and residential properties along the Avenue.
The partnership also manages a Façade Grant program created to aide business and property owners enhance the esthetics of the avenue. A business or property must be located within the SID in order to be eligible. This program has a number of facets including grants for Façade improvements, signage, awnings and landscaping. Considerations for awarding of grants include the quality of the design and its general compatibility with the streetscape vision for Springfield Avenue. This includes material selection, colors, design element arrangement and architectural harmony adjacent buildings and the impact on the building and District. All requests must follow all requirements of the Township of Maplewood’s zoning codes and ordinances. Façade improvements may be funded on a matching basis up to 50% of the project cost, not to exceed $15,000.00. Projects will be considered on a project-by-project basis. All grants will be matching grants.
The stated goal of the partnership is, “to create a stable, diverse, friendly commercial district that provides for the needs of the local community, draws strength from the municipal amenities on Springfield Avenue and brings new visitors into our district”.
Millburn has an Organization called the Downtown Millburn Development Alliance (DMDA) that is the management corporation of Millburn's Special Improvement District. DMDA'a mission is to enhance the downtown business community and to revitalize the Special Improvement District to make it a popular destination for residents and consumers and a highly successful location for business.
The City of Summit has created Summit Downtown, Inc (SDI) and has designated it the District Management Corporation, which encompasses all of the Central Retail Business District. Its’ mission is to work with businesses to improve their profitability and to provide the great mix of products and services that make Summit one of the premier retail communities in New Jersey and the northeast United States.
There is an emphasis on retail enhancement rather than merely on recruitment of new businesses. One of the principal goals is to focus on enhancing the strengths and attractiveness of current downtown businesses, in addition to enticing new retail businesses into whatever vacancies develop.
The state government is especially active in helping the economy grow. New Jersey is nearly at its all-time highest employment level. The State’s unemployment rate was 5.3 percent in April, and has been lower than the national rate for 12 straight months. New Jersey ranks fourth in the nation in the number of recent jobs created and the Garden State continues to lead the Northeast, creating more than twice as many jobs as any other state in the region in the last 12 months.
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