JERSEY CITY -- A Hudson County Superior Court judge on Friday halted Mayor Steve Fulop's attempt to bar PPG Industries from the chromium-contaminated land the firm is cleaning up on Garfield Avenue.

Fulop said last week that he wanted to stop the cleanup effective today because, he said, the firm refuses to clean up the land to the city's preferred standards. But Judge Hector Velazquez on Friday afternoon said the city cannot keep PPG from the site until after both sides meet in court.

"PPG, its agents, employees and independent contractors, shall have unrestricted access to the property, without any conditions," Velazquez said in the order.

City officials are not classifying Velazquez's order as a loss.

"PPG has chosen an inadequate way of addressing the remaining contamination at the site and intend to leave it as an undevelopable gravel pit," said city spokeswoman Jennifer Morrill. "Once the judge considers the technical aspects of the case and hears the long-term impact this will have on the community, we are confident we will prevail."

Last Tuesday, Fulop appeared at the Garfield Avenue site, flanked by elected officials and community leaders, to say he would keep PPG off the site until it agreed to install a major sewer system, street grid and other items that Fulop said would make the property attractive to developers.

Michael McCabe, the court-appointed administrator of the chromium cleanup, asked Velazquez to intervene and allow the cleanup to continue. The judge agreed.

The city will appear before Velazquez on May 1 to argue why PPG should be forced to remediate the site to the city's standards.

PPG owned and operated a chromium chemical production plant on the Garfield Avenue site from 1954 until it was shut down in 1963. The company has been tasked with cleaning up the hazardous waste that had been contaminating the area's soil since the plant opened in 1920.

The Jersey City Redevelopment Agency, which owns the Garfield Avenue site, envisions it as part of a 111-acre development called Canal Crossing. Fulop said last week that PPG's remediation plans, spelled out in a 2009 order between the city and PPG, would leave the property unattractive to developers.

PPG argued in a brief to Velazquez that the items Jersey City seeks are "outside the scope" of the 2009 agreement. That document requires PPG to remediate the chromium contamination to a level that permits redevelopment, but PPG is not required to perform redevelopment activities, according to the brief.

Velazquez did order PPG to notify city officials 72 hours in advance before installing capillary breaks, sheets of steel lined with plastic that are intended to prevent chromium in the groundwater from contaminating the site. City officials argue that once the capillary breaks are installed, any underground work will damage them and stick the city with the "burdensome" repairs.

The designated redeveloper of the site, part of an umbrella group called Hampshire, includes as investors former Gov. Jim Florio and Chris Daggett, a former gubernatorial candidate and ex-commissioner of the state Department of Environmental Protection. Daggett is also CEO of the Dodge Foundation, which awards grants to organizations working in the arts, education and the environment.

Terrence T. McDonald may be reached at tmcdonald@jjournal.com. Follow him on Twitter @terrencemcd. Find The Jersey Journal on Facebook.