Club Metro USA to Come to Manalapan

The Manalapan Planning Board will likely approve a resolution authorizing the development of a Club Metro USA gym within the Village Center Shopping Plaza on Wilson Avenue at their meeting tonight. Half of this shopping plaza is located within Manalapan Township and the other half is located within Englishtown Borough.

This gym is the last building that will complete the shopping plaza, Township Committeeman and former Planning Board Chairman Jack McNaboe said. The building will be approximately 13,000 square feet, including a 2,000 square foot loft. It will be located in back of the strip mall section of the plaza behind the retention pond.

Health and fitness centers were a new permitted use added into the Limited Business-Wilson Avenue zone when the Master Plan was amended last September.

The public hearing on the proposed health club was held at the Planning Board meeting on March 14 and continued at their last meeting on April 11. The Planning Board granted a variance for the gym pertaining to the outside facade of the building. This feature was solely decorative, but McNaboe said that it added to the look of the building so the Board approved the variance.

Relief was also granted to the owner for the setback off the road so that enough parking spaces for the gym are available. The Board allowed the parking spaces to extend a small amount beyond the 40 foot setback requirement in Manalapan, McNaboe said. Additional spaces for the gym will also be located behind the Dunkin’ Donuts.

All of the entryways into the Village Shopping Center, two off of Wilson Avenue and one off of Gordons Corner Road, are located within Englishtown Borough. Therefore, to get to this Manalapan gym you will have to travel into Englishtown as no new entry way will be created.

Within the Englishtown section of the shopping plaza, a 24-hour McDonald’s will also be constructed. McNaboe asserted that the Manalapan Planning Board was against this idea, but had no say in the matter as the location is completely within Englishtown’s borders and under the jurisdiction of the Englishtown Planning and Zoning Board.

McNaboe said that the added traffic for the gym will be minimal as the highest traffic for fitness centers are early in the morning and evening. “It’s minimal by comparison [to the McDonald’s] which is going to be much, much more severe.”

The resolution for the approval of the Club Metro gym will be in front of the Planning Board tonight. The Planning Board is meeting in the courtroom of the Manalapan Township Municipal Building at 8 p.m.

Club Metro USA has multiple locations throughout New Jersey, the closest being in Old Bridge, and one in Pennsylvania.