7-22-19 in New Jersey

NJ.com reports on the restaurants coming to the Meadowlands' soon to be opened American Dream Mall.

Enjoy.

In a separate article Alison Pries describes Northern New Jersey's permanent eyesore, the ironically named meadowlands:

Ask any number of people in New Jersey 'what are the Meadowlands?' and you'll probably get as many different answers.

Some will say it's where the Giants and Jets play football. To others, it's the track -- harness racing at the Meadowlands Racetrack. Or it's the home of that former eye-sore now known as American Dream (you know, the mega-mall that's set to open in October).

It's where North Jersey drivers get on the New Jersey Turnpike. And, too often, where traffic to the Lincoln Tunnel starts to crawl.

With the new Megamall opening this autumn the traffic is going to get soooo much worse. What happens when people want to go shopping when the Jets or Giants are playing a home game? Met Life Stadium will host a Jets or Giants game virtually every Sunday. 

Mall tourists coming out of Manhattan should clog the roads up even more.

Looks to us like an excuse not to head to Manhattan on the Weekends. Not that we needed another.

For decades the industrialized Meadowlands have given the state a bad name with New Yorkers. They certainly did with this New Yorker growing up. Giants Stadium, the railways, the Pulaski Skyway, Newark Liberty Airport - these are the first things people see coming out of the Lincoln Tunnel. 

But Pries points out that tucked between dumps and rail embankments are vast bits of swamp and marsh, creeks and the Hackensack River. They're quite popular with hikers and kayakers. To us the wetlands have always been at once fascinating and creepy.