The property, 2300 Route 1, is a 212-acre site bounded by US Route 1, Commerce Road, and the Northeast Corridor Passenger Rail Line. This property was commonly known as the Johnson & Johnson North Brunswick Campus.
The rectangular site benefits from over 4,000 feet of frontage on US Route 1 and over 5,000 feet of frontage on the Northeast Corridor Rail Line. The primary access points to the property are full-access, signalized intersections at Commerce Drive to the north and Aaron Road on the south end of the property. Main Street NB will add two additional access locations along the Route 1 frontage.
The Johnson & Johnson office, manufacturing, and research facility was constructed in 1955 and expanded in the 1970s and again in the 1980s to encompass a total of 1,133,000 square feet of space under roof. 2300 Route 1 had been zoned I-2 Industrial for many years, with manufacturing, research and testing, office, medical clinics, hotels, warehouse, and distribution uses permitted. The underlying I-2 zone provides for a 75-foot height limit with density and coverage limits that would allow in excess of 3.6 million square feet of space and associated parking.
North Brunswick TOD Associates LLC (NBTOD) purchased the property from Johnson & Johnson in 2006. Many Community Workshops were hosted by NBTOD that year, with hundreds of members of the local community invited to learn and contribute their ideas and suggestions. The workshops focused on subjects such as smart growth, transit-oriented development, suburban sprawl, planning around train stations, and specifically on zoning and planning for the site.
The Community Workshops helped stimulate discussion on planning and zoning choices that led to the creation of a great place in North Brunswick, to be known as Main Street North Brunswick.
Following the 2010 series of Community Workshops, the Township engaged in a lengthy planning and study process, which concluded in 2012 with the adoption of a new zoning ordinance creating the Transit-Oriented Mixed-Use Development Overlay zone.