Jersey City is eyeing a building adjacent to the Journal Square PATH station as a location for a new art museum.

The city is in preliminary talks with Hudson County officials to purchase the four-story building at 25 Journal Square, also known as Pathside and owned by Hudson County Community College. The plan is for an expanded version of the Jersey City Museum, which essentially shuttered in 2010.

The move comes as city officials target Journal Square with policies they hope will transform the gritty center of the city into a destination rivaling the fashionable Downtown. Hefty tax breaks have been granted to new residential towers near the Journal Square PATH hub, while zoning rules have been changed to encourage developers to build more office space.

The deal with HCCC, if approved by college officials, would give the proposed museum a location with much higher visibility than the last home of the Jersey City Museum at Montgomery and Monmouth streets, a 10-minute walk to the nearest PATH station. 25 Journal Square is literally next door to the PATH station, and will soon be surrounded by five high-rises of luxury apartments.

A request for comment from HCCC President Glen Gabert was not returned. Hudson County Executive Tom DeGise declined to discuss preliminary discussions, while Mayor Steve Fulop called talks early but "substantive."

"This museum would be larger in scale, have a broader collection, be a destination for the region, located near mass transportation and it would fulfill the need of a cultural center for the city," Fulop said.

Fulop had hoped to remake the Landmark Loew's Jersey Theatre into a regional music and entertainment destination. His attempts to hand over management of the city-owned theater to a global concert promoter were halted by a judge, so his administration turned its eye to a different sort of venue.

The Jersey City Museum was founded in 1901 as part of the city's library system.

In 2001, the museum moved to 350 Montgomery St., where its 10,000-piece collection was featured in 38,000 square feet of galleries. The location was a former municipal garage the museum renovated at a cost of $11 million.

"I firmly believe that this is a place on the rise, " Alejandro Anreus, the museum's curator, said in 2001. "A major city like this deserves a major art museum."

But city and private funding soon began to evaporate. After the Sept. 11, 2001 terrorist attacks, donors who had previously given $120,000 would give $5,000 instead, Ben Dineen, the museum's chairman, told The Jersey Journal in 2011. Dineen died in 2014.

The city stopped funding the museum entirely in 2011. In 2010, museum hours were cut to Saturday afternoons only. It closed its doors for the holidays that December and never reopened. Its collection is in storage.

In December 2011, Jersey City Medical Center-Barnabas Health purchased 350 Montgomery St., moved administrative offices to its upper floors, allowing the museum to host shows on the ground floor.

It's not clear when the museum's latest show was. Its Facebook page has not been updated since January 2013.

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