EnCap Golf Holdings, based in Tampa, FL, is the developer, and the three-year-old organization has made brownfields-to-golf-links its development specialty. "We are assuming all cleanup and landfill capping costs, which will save taxpayers millions of dollars," according to EnCap president William Gauger. "This will be the largest brownfields conversion project in New Jersey's history."

EnCap plans to build four different golf courses, 72 holes in all with spectacular views of the Manhattan skyline, with at least one of the four open to the general public. Besides the links, EnCap plans to build a 650-room hotel, conference facilities, a marina and some mixed commercial space. HMDC will lease the land to EnCap for a reported $6.2 million a year for 99 years, and while Gauger won't put a price tag on the project, earlier reports indicated that the total cost, including remediation of the sites, could run as high as $2.5 billion.

The developer plans to use materials dredged from New York harbor in the Port Authority of NY/NJ's ongoing port deepening program to cap the landfills. A processing plant along the adjacent Hackensack River will remove any contaminants, according to Gauger. Most of the landfill sites involved are inactive, although at least one location is still an active garbage dump.