The former Kmart at 940 Easton Avenue is no longer slated for demolition, and the center's leasing page lists it as "Newly Leased - TBA."
The withdrawn apartment plan and the new lease keep the plaza's largest space a retail space. Around it, the tenants that signed on over the past year lean toward entertainment, fitness, and food, the kind of places where a family can spend an afternoon.
Two Years as an Apartment Plan
The Kmart at Easton Avenue and JFK Boulevard held its closing sale in 2018, according to a TAPinto Franklin Township photo of the store.
The proposal that followed would have removed the building entirely. Levin Properties, L.P. applied to the Franklin Township Zoning Board of Adjustment under application ZBA-24-00001 for a four-story, 200-unit apartment building on the Kmart site, Block 385, Lot 2.07, in the General Business zone. TAPinto described a building with ground-level parking, rooftop solar, an outdoor pool, and pedestrian links to the existing shops. The Franklin Reporter & Advocate reported in June 2024 that under the plan, the strip of storefronts would go from 13 retail spaces to 17.
The Zoning Board's agendas trace what happened next:
- April 4, 2024: the board heard testimony on the application.
- July 17, 2025: the hearing was carried to December 4, 2025.
- December 4, 2025: it was carried again, to March 19, 2026.
- May 21, 2026: the Board of Adjustment agenda listed the application with one line beneath it: "THIS APPLICATION HAS BEEN WITHDRAWN."
On October 13, 2026, less than five months after that agenda, the Franklin Reporter & Advocate reported that the former Kmart and several attached spaces had been leased, with a formal announcement to come. The center's management describes the lease as "a significant milestone reflecting strong retailer demand."
The Smaller Spaces Filled In While the Box Waited
While the apartment application was being carried from one hearing date to the next, the rest of the plaza kept leasing. The center's management lists Bounce Air Adventure Park, Wingstop, Crunch Fitness, and a newly built McDonald's with a double drive-thru as recent additions.
As of October 2026, the tenant roster reads like this:
- Fitness and entertainment: Crunch Fitness at 22,898 square feet and Bounce Air Adventure Park at 20,810
- Food: Flame Kabob House, Wingstop, a coffee shop, and McDonald's
- Everyday stops: Stop & Shop, Dollar Tree, Chase Bank, Cutters Barbershop, Venus Jewelers, Plaza Cleaners, GNC, and Llanio & Casas Associates
- Still open for a tenant: a 3,000-square-foot space and a 4,000-square-foot second-generation restaurant space, with Plaza Cleaners' and GNC's spaces listed as coming available
Crunch and Bounce Air together take up more than 43,000 square feet. That's more than half the size of the 74,000-square-foot Stop & Shop that anchors the center, and both are places to spend an hour or two.
What Took the Old OfficeMax
The biggest change residents can already walk into is at 940 Easton Avenue, Suite 1, in the space OfficeMax used to occupy. Bounce Air Adventure Park held its Franklin Township Chamber of Commerce ribbon cutting on August 6, 2026. TAPinto reported that Mayor Phil Kramer, Councilman-at-Large Ram Anbarasan, Chamber President Nicolas DiMeglio, and Chamber First Vice President of Events Bill Grippo attended.
According to Bounce Air's attractions page, the park includes:
- An adventure playground and a Super Climber
- A ninja course and a trampoline court
- A sports court
- Slides, climbing walls, and climbing pillars
- A light-up challenge floor
- An arcade
- A toddler ball pit
A ropes course is listed as coming soon.
At the ribbon cutting, Grippo described the park this way, as quoted in TAPinto's coverage:
"a wholesome environment where kids can be active"
In the same article, DiMeglio said the park gives children a reason to "get off their phones," and Anbarasan said it "creates jobs" for the local economy. Hours have changed since opening and holiday hours vary, so check Bounce Air's site before a Thanksgiving-week or school-break visit.
Food Is Following the Foot Traffic
The food leases arrived in the same stretch. MyCentralJersey reported on June 3, 2026 that Wingstop had leased 1,848 square feet at Rutgers Plaza. The same report named MAWJ, a coffee and espresso concept, as another recent addition.
In that report, Levin Management CEO Matthew K. Harding explained the trend. He said grocery-anchored centers keep attracting restaurant operators who want the steady traffic that everyday shopping trips bring.
The center's own figures show how much traffic that is. As of October 2026, the leasing page puts Rutgers Plaza at 2.4 million visits a year and Easton Avenue at an average of 35,971 vehicles a day. It also notes the plaza sits close to I-287 Exit 10 and Rutgers University. With a 4,000-square-foot second-generation restaurant space still listed as available, the food lineup has room to grow.
A Box Bigger Than Stop & Shop
The former Kmart is the largest space in the plaza. At 107,566 square feet, it's about 45 percent bigger than the Stop & Shop next door, and it makes up roughly 40 percent of the center's 266,157 square feet of leasable space. On the leasing page's tenant table, it covers five unit numbers, 12 through 16.
Under the apartment plan, all of that floor area would have come down. The plan would also have rebuilt the storefront strip around a residential building. With the application withdrawn and the space leased, the plaza keeps its existing footprint: the Stop & Shop, the strip of storefronts, the McDonald's double drive-thru, and the big box between them. Whatever opens in those units will become the plaza's largest single tenant, more than twice the size of Crunch Fitness and Bounce Air combined.
The Franklin Reporter & Advocate and the TAPinto Franklin Township business section have covered each step at Rutgers Plaza so far, from the Bounce Air ribbon cutting to the October lease report.
A change this big at the shopping center on Easton Avenue is part of the picture for the streets around it. If you own a home near Easton Avenue and want to talk through how the Rutgers Plaza changes fit into a sale or a move-up plan, reach out to Jeff Smith at Freeman Smith. He'll walk you through what the next tenant could mean for your corner of Franklin Township. Let's Connect.
