Plaza 1000, the brick-colored, and long-vacant, office building with the green roof, would be demolished under a plan to redevelop part of Main Street in Voorhees. The Mansion on Main Street, a popular wedding and events venue, is the white building in front and would remain.
When homebuilder John B. Canuso envisioned in 1986 his Main Street residential/commercial complex in Voorhees, the developer spoke of a town within a town on the Cherry Hill border.
"I hope it becomes the downtown of Voorhees Township," Canuso told this reporter at the time, in an interview for an article that appeared in The Philadelphia Inquirer.
Then-Mayor James L. Curran of Voorhees said some in his town had mixed reactions. "There's some skepticism that this is going to be as great a thing as Mr. Canuso claims it will be," the mayor said in the Inquirer article of what was eventually to be a $200 million project (about a half-billion dollars today).
The Main Street complex has not enjoyed sustained success over the last 35 years and the six-story Plaza 1000 office building has been particularly hard hit: It has been completely vacant since at least 2016.
Plaza 1000, the landmark structure at the hub of Main Street with a large green roof, would be demolished and replaced by three separate four-story buildings with 280 "luxury" apartments, according to plans submitted to the Township Planning Board.
The board on May 25 is scheduled to hear testimony about preliminary and final major site plans and a subdivision of the property, owned by Brandywine Plaza 1000 LLC and Brandywine-Main Street LLC, both part of Brandywine Realty Trust of Center City Philadelphia.
Even in 2016 the Township realized the troubles at Plaza 1000, which by then had been discontinued as an office building.
"Plaza 1000 is in a state of obsolescence and has become substandard both in design aspects as an office building to the point where it has unwholesome working conditions and, even if Plaza 1000 was remodeled to include upgrades or more modern office conditions, the construction designs of the building itself and the very large size would still render the building obsolete," according to a December 2016 Township Council resolution designating the property as a redevelopment area.
"This Redevelopment Plan, by providing for the transformation of a currently vacant and obsolete office building into a residential community that will complement the surrounding Main Street development, is advancing the goals and objectives of the Township's Master Plan," according to an April 2021 Township redevelopment plan by CME Associates of Howell, New Jersey.
In his May 15 report to the Planning Board, board engineer Rakesh R. Darji of Environmental Resolutions Inc. of Mount Laurel stated that the applicant should specify whether any of the proposed units are designated for affordable housing or if other arrangements will be made to satisfy the affordable housing obligation of the project.
The original partners in the Main Street complex were Canuso and Sun Co.'s real estate subsidiary, Radnor Corp.
An article in The Philadelphia Inquirer by Neill Borowski in November 1986 with John B. Canuso's aspirations for his Main Street Voorhees project.
A side view of the Plaza 1000 office building that is scheduled for demolition at Main Street, Voorhees.
