At the Seton Village tree-lighting on Friday, Dec. 12, where the Irvington Avenue Corridor was officially named Seton Village, were, from left, Fahim Abedrabbo, associate director of government and community relations; Samuel Matino, resident senator/chairman for village relations; Morgan Kulessa, ad-hoc for village relations; Joseph Puleo, resident senator/senate speaker for village relations; Timothy Hoffman, Student Government Association president; and Teagan Sebba, SGA secretary, who were all involved in the renaming of the area.
SOUTH ORANGE — As part of a larger effort to improve the overall look and feel of South Orange’s Irvington Avenue Corridor, the Irvington Avenue Corridor Advisory Committee has officially named the area Seton Village.
But the new name did not come just for the sake of change. Instead, it signaled the creation of a whole new brand for the neighborhood, and banners displaying the Seton Village logo hung prominently on gas lamps throughout the area last week. It all led up to the Light Up the Holidays event on Friday, Dec. 12, during which Seton Village was officially christened.
According to Doug Zacker, chairman of the Irvington Avenue Corridor Advisory Committee, naming the corridor was always a priority for the committee, since it was formed by the South Orange Board of Trustees in January, because, by giving the area a name, a community identity is formed.
“Branding helps in social media; it gets people talking about it and even just the logo makes it more appealing,” Zacker told the News-Record in a phone interview on Thursday, Dec. 11. “The branding is definitely a piece of our overall strategy to really create a more vibrant area.”
Zacker said the name “Seton Village” itself was arrived at after a marketing subcommittee was formed to come up with names for the area, as well as field suggestions from residents on social media. In the end, he said the subcommittee narrowed all ideas down to three options — Uptown South Orange, Irvana and Seton Village — which were then presented to the public in an online poll. Once the poll results showed Seton Village was overwhelmingly popular across all demographics, and following comprehensive research and interviews done by the subcommittee on the matter, he said Seton Village was the clear choice.
A key reason for this was because the name “Seton Village” aligns the corridor with nearby Seton Hall University, which Zacker called a “great partner” in improving the area. In fact, he said it was a study conducted by Seton Hall’s Market Research Center that first identified the improvements desired by people in the corridor, which the Irvington Avenue Corridor Advisory Committee has been working on ever since. Two of the committee’s 12 regular members are representatives of the university as well.
Fahim Abedrabbo, associate director of government relations at Seton Hall, is one such representative eager to see the corridor prosper. Abedrabbo told the News-Record many students visit and work in the area, so making Seton Village thrive helps everyone.
“It shows that the community is one,” said Abedrabbo in a phone interview on Friday, Dec. 12. “South Orange and Seton Hall are neighbors.”
“Seton Hall always hopes South Orange will do well,” Abedrabbo said.
Though it has existed for less than a year, the Irvington Avenue Corridor Advisory Committee has already made great strides in improving the corridor. Zacker listed cleaning up the area through beautification events, brightening up the corridor by adding lighting and publicizing local businesses by hosting major gatherings such as Light Up the Holidays and the Food Truck Festival, which took place earlier this year, as some of the committee’s accomplishments. He said the food truck event alone was attended by 2,500 people, many of whom went on to discover what else the area had to offer.
“There was a very high percentage of people there who had never really considered what was on that street,” Zacker said. “And we heard from a few restaurant owners about people walking in from the Food Truck Festival saying ‘Oh my gosh, I had no idea that this place was even here.’ So that was a huge success.”
Inkosi, owner of Inkosi’s Cafe, is one business owner who is quite pleased with what the Irvington Avenue Corridor Advisory Committee has accomplished so far. She lauded the fact that many of the committee members are either residents or business owners from the corridor, since locals are the ones who would best know what the area needs. Now, she said she is just looking forward to experiencing the benefits of their future improvements.
“They have been doing a wonderful job this year,” Inkosi told the News-Record in a phone interview on Thursday, Dec. 11. “I hope to see that continue in the time to come, which I think it will. They are passionate about it. They are engaged. They are just eager to make this area a success. So I think they are on the right track.”
Indeed, the Irvington Avenue Corridor Advisory Committee is just getting started in its plans to revitalize the corridor. Zacker said, during the next year, he hopes the committee will increase the number of gas lamps in the area and host more community events. He said the Irvington Avenue Corridor Advisory Committee, along with Newark and Maplewood, also recently applied for a mobility grant that, if received, would go toward making Irvington Avenue safer for pedestrians. Additionally, Zacker said he would like to continue building working relationships with local businesses and Seton Hall.
Though the Irvington Avenue Corridor Advisory Committee has used some of the $15,000 allocated by the Board of Trustees to carry out its efforts, Zacker pointed out that the committee has not touched the $100,000 given to it by the board for capital improvements. He said the committee wants to identify what the money is most needed for before it is committed to any particular project.
And the Irvington Avenue Corridor Advisory Committee is not even the only group looking to help the corridor.
According to Trustee Sheena Collum, who is also a committee member, the board is currently considering a matching grant program for facade improvements. In an email sent to the News-Record on Monday, Dec. 15, Collum explained, by allocating a portion of the budget and creating a design review board, businesses and property owners can partner with the village and design professionals to improve the overall aesthetics of the area, which were identified as a particular sore point among locals.
Yet even with all of the improvements the Irvington Avenue Corridor Advisory Committee has made so far, perhaps its most meaningful accomplishment was simply bringing neighbors closer together. As Collum pointed out, nothing could have happened without everyone’s cooperation, which shows how much the committee has done to unite the area now known as Seton Village.
“No government initiative is successful without partners and buy-in from various stakeholders,” Collum said.
“The success this committee has had to date is a direct result of residents, business owners and Seton Hall participating in setting direction and having boots on the ground for implementation.”