CAMDEN - A long-hidden vista here could be coming into view.

The state Department of Environmental Protection is launching an ambitious project to restore the waterfront along the Delaware and Cooper rivers in the city's Cramer Hill neighborhood.

Workers also will cap the former Harrison Avenue landfill, allowing the long-blighted spot to be used for recreational purposes, according to information from the DEP.

The agency expects it will cost at least $25 million to restore a 62-acre tract near the Salvation Army Kroc Center. The 120,000-square-foot community center opened three years ago on a restored section of the landfill near Harrison and State Street.

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The planned project is to include a 2-acre fishing pond near Harrison Avenue and East State Street, according to a notice to potential contractors.

About 3 acres of forested land will be preserved “as bald eagle forage areas,” it adds.

Workers also will build an amphitheater, a kayak launch and trails in an area that's now largely inaccessible.

The project "will give the public its first waterfront access to this area of Camden in nearly 70 years," said the DEP, which plans a formal announcement Wednesday.

The landfill, which was never capped or closed, operated from 1952 until 1971.

A strip of densely forested land, littered with tires, bottles and other debris, now rises like a wall between the landfill and the Delaware River. A visitor, who must carefully navigate past mounds of trash, thick underbrush and an occasional campsite, can only see the river when practically atop its steep banks.

The restoration work will occur as Camden County officials are creating a nature preserve on another part of the Delaware River waterfront in Cramer Hill. It will be about 16 blocks to the north, on a heavily wooded, 35-acre site that once held a sewage treatment plant across from Petty's Island.

The preserve is expected to open in the spring of 2018, said Freeholder Jeffrey Nash, who noted the county recently completed Phoenix Park on South Camden's waterfront.

"The state is investing millions of dollars to open the river back up to the community,” said Nash, who described the landfill area as “shuttered, polluted and off-limits to residents for decades.”

He noted the Cramer Hill sites will eventually connect to a planned state park on Petty's Island, "creating a sprawling greenspace that will improve the quality of life for everyone in the area.”

Part of the DEP's project calls for replanting trees on some 26 acres of the site and re-establishing undergrowth to prevent erosion.

Workers also are to create about 5 acres of freshwater wetlands along the Cooper River and about 1.5 acres along the Delaware, the notice says.

Some 3,000 feet of shoreline will be graded to create a stable slope.

The landfill will be covered with about 75,000 cubic yards of dredge spoils already stored at the site, the notice says. That will create a two-foot “soil cap” with trees, shrubs and other “vegetative cover.”

The project does not give a timeline for the project, which is expected to begin early next year. The DEP has asked contractors to submit bids by Jan. 5.

Jim Walsh: @jwalsh_cp; 856-486-2646; jwalsh@gannettnj.com



