A stretch of undeveloped, old-growth forest owned by Wayne Township is about to become 113 apartments, all of them designated affordable housing, after the township's Planning Board signed off on the project earlier this year. The development, called Barbour Pond Village, will rise on 9.45 acres of municipally owned woods sitting between the Pancake Hollow neighborhood and Barbour Pond Road, just off Valley Road near Wayne Hills High School.
The Planning Board approved the project in May and adopted a resolution memorializing that approval on July 13, according to Jersey Digs. The site, long zoned for office research use, was formally identified as an area in need of redevelopment, and Wayne Township adopted a redevelopment plan for the property in March, a designation that supersedes the old office-research zoning entirely. Township officials then issued a request for proposals to potential redevelopers before settling on a partner for the site.
That partner is Wayne Valley Road Village LP, an entity tied to Montclair-based RPM Development Group, which was selected as the redeveloper for the project, the outlet's reporting notes. Edward Martoglio, CEO and co-founder of RPM, owns 100% of Wayne Valley Road Village. RPM, founded in 1986, has built a reputation across New Jersey for affordable housing work, including breaking ground in 2023 on the state's first family affordable community built to Passive House and Zero Energy Ready Home standards, in Madison, according to RPM Development Group.
A Milestone Redevelopment Deal
Law firm Semeraro & Fahrney, LLC represented the redevelopment team in securing site plan approval from the township, a deal the firm has described as Wayne's first official redevelopment project under New Jersey redevelopment law, according to EIN Presswire. That legal groundwork traces back to February 5, when Wayne Township and Wayne Valley Road Village LP executed a formal affordable housing agreement under municipal Resolution 131, establishing terms meant to satisfy a portion of the township's Fourth Round Mount Laurel housing obligation, per records posted by the Township of Wayne.
Development applications filed with the Passaic County Planning Board in April detail how the 9.45-acre parcel at Block 3103, Lot 14.05 will be subdivided into three lots, with the project itself spanning two of them. The plan calls for one three-story building with 51 units and one four-story building with 62 units, accessed via full-movement driveways on Valley Road, according to the county filings. Per Jersey Digs, the finished complex will include 22 one-bedroom apartments, 67 two-bedroom apartments, and 24 three-bedroom apartments, with the buildings targeted for the center of the acreage. Traffic studies forecast the development will add roughly 40 weekday morning peak-hour trips and 52 weekday evening peak-hour trips to the surrounding roads.
Why Wayne Is Racing to Build Affordable Units
The approval fits into a much larger statewide shift. In March 2024, Governor Phil Murphy signed legislation abolishing the Council on Affordable Housing and replacing it with a streamlined administrative process run by the Department of Community Affairs, according to the New Jersey Department of Community Affairs. That reform swapped out court-managed litigation for state-calculated housing targets covering the 2025-2035 Fourth Round compliance period.
Those calculations, released in October 2024, identified a statewide prospective need for 84,698 new affordable units. Wayne Township itself faces an estimated Fourth Round assessment of roughly 1,000 affordable units through 2035, a burden that has pushed local officials to lean on municipally owned land for developments that are 100% affordable, per reporting compiled by the Wayne Community Corner. Inclusionary zoning, by contrast, can require five to seven market-rate units for every affordable unit built, which drives up overall density far more than a wholly affordable project on public land.
Barbour Pond Village is not the only Valley Road corridor project answering that pressure. Wayne Township Council authorized a litigation settlement in July 2025 with AvalonBay Communities Inc. allowing a 275-unit residential complex at 1655 Valley Road, with 42 units, or 15%, designated affordable to satisfy Third Round Mount Laurel requirements, according to Daily Voice. Together, the two projects illustrate how former commercial office parks along Valley Road are increasingly being converted into higher-density housing.
Bats, Wetlands and Stormwater Rules Attached to the Site
The Barbour Pond Village site is not a blank slate. Jersey Digs describes the property as an undeveloped, old-growth forested lot with environmental constraints including a wetland area, and notes it has been identified as a potential roosting area for a long-eared bat species. The northern long-eared bat is classified as federally endangered by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, a status that triggers seasonal restrictions barring the clearing of roosting trees during the June and July breeding months and requires mitigation such as bat boxes wherever tree cover is disturbed, according to the Conserve Wildlife Foundation of New Jersey.
In line with those federal protections, the developer was instructed to install bat boxes to replace habitat in any trees that need to be cleared for construction, per Jersey Digs' report on the approval. During Planning Board hearings in June, municipal officials went further, requiring the developer to record stormwater management plans directly with the property deed and to execute a binding Developer's Agreement before the township will issue certificates of occupancy for any building, according to minutes posted by the Wayne Township Planning Board. The 1805 Valley Road project is now formally included in Wayne's broader affordable housing plan, positioning it as one of the township's key answers to a state mandate that shows no sign of easing before 2035.
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