I responded to that same person saying “I bet you’ve seen a lot of change”, why are you making me regret posting here?

also Key Food was quite disgusting for a long time, they have had a few changes of ownership over the years and I like the current one, but Pathmark where 99 Ranch is now was the place to go back then.

once Big Chef (RIP) opened, they were usually open on holidays, but that was a little later.

in like 1990, but anything that did exist was not open on holidays.

one thing I always tell people is that there was so little here at that point, that if it was a holiday and you needed food, literally your only alternative was to take the PATH into Manhattan, as all of the few places to get food in Downtown JC were closed.

also I watched the second WTC tower come down that day, from Christopher Columbus Dr. I will never ever forget the collective gasp from the people filling the street around me, crazy.

I was even here for the earlier WTC bombing in 93, I was working nights in the city then and couldn't get to work because (of course) the PATH had shut down.

I moved here in 1988, downtown was not very safe then. I lived on Christopher Columbus Dr just off Jersey, on the same block as the bagel store (which opened a few years later), and for a while the building next door was a crack den (right on CC Dr!).