Northern New Jersey is home to a wide variety of buildings containing office or retail space, from high-rise towers along the waterfront in Jersey City to office parks and indoor malls along the Route 17 corridor in suburban Bergen County to small shopping plazas in rural Sussex County. As trends in the real estate industry continue to shift, how will the state’s northernmost counties be impacted? An event today in Downtown Newark will bring those involved in the business together in order to answer that question.

This afternoon, the North Jersey Transportation Planning Authority (NJTPA) will host the ‘Spotlight on Repurposing Property to Support Economic Development’ forum as part of the Together North Jersey (TNJ) initiative in its offices at the One Newark Center. The event is free and open to the public, and is the first of a new series of public workshops regarding “strategies for identifying uses for properties that no longer can be used for their original purposes.” It will include a discussion of why the state of the local real estate market can cause vacant properties and how these sites such as sprawling office parks in the suburbs, brownfield lots, strip malls, indoor shopping centers, and massive industrial structures can be adaptively reused, according to TNJ.

There will also be breakout sessions with meetings of the TNJ’s Competitive, Efficient, Livable, and Resilient task forces following the plenary session.

One project in the NJTPA’s 13-county region that has managed to revitalize a large office structure is Bell Works in Monmouth County. Although the building was vacant after its sole previous occupant shifted operations from the facility, it is now open for the public to visit and is home to a local library, multiple companies, a market, shops, and co-working space. Another project, The Corner at Livingston Circle in Essex County, saw the demolition of a vacant restaurant and the construction of a complex with some of the country’s fastest growing chains, including Shake Shack, Blaze Pizza, and The Container Store.

Those interested in learning more about these kinds of projects can either RSVP to today’s event here or come at 12:30 p.m. to register. The event will begin at 1:00 p.m. on the 17th floor of 1085 Raymond Boulevard.