A 41,115-square-foot industrial facility is moving forward at 9 Porete Ave. in North Arlington, with developers securing construction financing to build a last-mile distribution warehouse in the heart of the Meadowlands. The project marks the second industrial redevelopment that The Hampshire Companies has pursued on the same stretch of road in just a few years.
According to Daily Voice, commercial real estate firm JLL announced that construction financing had been secured for the project, with JLL Capital Markets arranging the loan from Glacier Credit Strategies on behalf of The Hampshire Companies LLC. The amount of the loan was not disclosed. The site sits within North Arlington's 25-acre Porete Avenue Redevelopment Area, a pocket of the Meadowlands that has drawn steady developer interest.
Once built, the facility will feature 40-foot ceilings, nine loading dock doors, one drive-in door, a 135-foot truck court and 30 parking spaces, designed to accommodate last-mile delivery operators and other industrial tenants. The site's location is central to its appeal: it sits about eight miles from Manhattan, roughly two miles north of New Jersey Turnpike Exit 15W, about five miles from both Newark Liberty International Airport and Teterboro Airport, 6.5 miles from the Lincoln Tunnel, and seven miles from the Holland Tunnel.
Hampshire's Second Bet on Porete Avenue
This isn't Hampshire's first move on the block. The Morristown-based developer previously demolished underused buildings at 12 Porete Ave. in 2022 and completed a 108,993-square-foot industrial facility there in 2023, the report notes. That earlier project traces back to October 2022, when JLL arranged a three-year construction loan through BMO Financial Group for a joint venture between Hampshire and Invesco Real Estate to build a 111,660-square-foot warehouse replacing a demolished 91,000-square-foot facility at that address.
Hampshire is described as a privately held real estate firm and fund manager with more than 65 years of commercial real estate development and asset management experience. Michael Klein said the Meadowlands continues to attract significant interest from developers and lenders, and that Hampshire's vision addresses a critical need in a supply-constrained market. Per Klein, the Meadowlands draws that interest because of its position between New York City and regional port infrastructure, and modern industrial space addresses a critical need in a market where supply remains tight.
A Corridor With Deep Industrial Roots
The 9 Porete Ave. site has its own industrial history. EPA records show the property previously housed industrial operations, including Ragen Precision Industries, which required hazardous waste tracking under U.S. Environmental Protection Agency Region 2 oversight. Legacy industrial uses like this one have frequently required environmental remediation before modern construction could proceed along the corridor.
The Borough of North Arlington established the original Porete Avenue Redevelopment Area by municipal ordinance back on June 23, 1992, under New Jersey's Local Redevelopment and Housing Law, aiming to rehabilitate underutilized industrial and brownfield properties. The borough's redevelopment plan regulations set firm parameters for new construction: principal industrial structures must maintain a minimum building size of 40,000 square feet or 45% of lot area, a maximum building height of 60 feet, and maximum lot coverage of 70%, according to borough records.
The municipal footprint on Porete Avenue may be expanding further. In December 2025, the North Arlington Planning Board published notice of a public hearing regarding an amended 112-acre study area across more than 30 tax lots in the Porete Avenue area, evaluating potential condemnation redevelopment designation, per the borough's own notice. State trade group Circulate NJ has cited the Porete Avenue redevelopment work as an example of private logistics developers investing capital to remediate contaminated brownfield sites across New Jersey.
Rents Climb as Vacancy Shrinks
The financial backdrop helps explain why developers keep returning to this corridor. Average asking rents for Class A industrial space across New Jersey reached $34.20 per square foot in early 2026, up from $33.94 a year prior, according to JLL. Meanwhile, Cushman & Wakefield reported that the Meadowlands industrial submarket posted 937,037 square feet of positive net occupancy gains by mid-2025, pushing its submarket vacancy rate down to 8.4%.
Part of the draw is geography. Logistics locations in the Meadowlands submarket allow distributors to reach nearly one-third of the U.S. population within a 24-hour drive via Interstates 78 and 80 and the New Jersey Turnpike, per JLL's analysis. With construction financing now in place for 9 Porete Ave., the second phase of Hampshire's redevelopment push is set to add another modern distribution hub to a corridor that has been targeted for industrial revitalization for more than three decades.
