Newark, New Jersey, USA
The current form of Newark, New Jersey’s largest city often neglected, is the product of late 19th-century industrialization, waves of immigration, and then emigrations.
A landscape of railroad tracks, highways, and parking lots tell the story of the city’s rise, demise, and now its renaissance.
Mulberry Commons by Sage and Coombe Architects, received a 2025 International Architecture Honourable Mention from The Chicago Athenaeum: Museum of Architecture and Design.
As the railroads crisscrossed the city in the mid to late 19th century a considerable concern for public safety arose.
In response, rail companies operating in Newark were required to elevate their tracks. The effect, though initially beneficial, had the result of partitioning the town.
Once connected neighborhoods were physically separated. With the demise of the railroad and the advent of the automobile in post-WWII America, partitioning was reenacted by traffic engineers. Public space was sacrificed for the sake of expediency.
As the downtown was abandoned, derelict buildings were demolished and sites were paved.
Mulberry Commons grew out of the need and opportunity to reimagine Newark’s center and to address the historic legacies of industrialization and short-sighted planning.
Commissioned by the City, the project is the result of a remarkable public-private partnership.
The five-acre site of parking lots is an inspirational oasis in a sea of asphalt that transformed parking lots into parkland to reconnect a historically divided city.
Organized in two phases, Mulberry Commons is social infrastructure: a composition of landscaped spaces and amenities – or rooms – supporting different activities are arrayed enfilade from the Prudential Arena to Peter Francisco Park in the Ironbound district.
The effect will be to catalyze development in the adjacent sites, continuing the transformation of asphalt into places for people to live and work, critical elements of any city’s center.
The first phase of the project, Mulberry Commons Park opened in 2019.
Balancing landscape and hardscape, the park is an emblem of Newark’s vision of the future—a dynamic and welcoming space featuring areas of active and passive recreation, a flexible event lawn, intimate seating terraces, a play area, an illuminated interactive fountain, a botanical garden, and a setting for public art.
The second phase extends the park as an elevated plaza spanning a highway and the Amtrak Northeast Corridor, two physical barriers that have long divided the downtown. This extension will knit together a network of public green spaces to create an accessible pedestrian pathway between the Downtown, Newark Penn Station, the Ironbound District, and the planned Passaic River waterfront park.
The proposed train hall set to the south of historic Penn Station and over the railroad tracks, is another room along the public path.
It will increase accessible access to the train platforms, encourage the use of public transportation, provide a 21st-century landmark whose architectural heritage is borne of the great train halls of the early 20th century, and be visible from the surrounding neighborhoods.
By spurring local redevelopment and mitigating the harm of earlier planning decisions that isolated the city’s neighborhoods, this project is a critical step in the transformation of Newark.
Architects: Sage and Coombe Architects
Lead Architects: Jennifer Sage and Peter Coombe
Design Team: Jennifer Sage, Peter Coombe and David Hess, Abdulgader Naseer, Christina Draghi, Russell Einbinder, Lee Kuhn, Sam Lee, and Max St. Pierre
Landscape Architects: Supermass Studio, Taewook Cha Principal
Consulting Engineers and Designers: Arup, GFT, HLB, KSE, Pennoni, Pentagram, Thornton Tomasetti
General Contractor, Phase 1: Flanagan’s Contracting Group
Client: City of Newark, Mayor Ras Baraka
Photographer: Paul Warchol
