The Times sold the building, and the 5.9 acres on which it stands, in 2011, moving its operations to a modern facility at River View Plaza within batting range of the Trenton Thunder's Arm & Hammer Park.
The sprawling brick building at the intersection of Route 130 and Perry Street in Trenton once echoed with the sounds of reporters on deadline, calling sources and scrambling to bring the most up-to-date news to their readers.
Today, the former headquarters for the Times of Trenton is more notable for windows spray-painted with graffiti, and doors covered over with wooden boards.
The Times sold the building, and the 5.9 acres on which it stands, in 2011, moving its operations to a modern facility at River View Plaza within batting range of the Trenton Thunder's Arm & Hammer Park.
Now hopes are high that the one-time newsroom and the advertising sales office abutting it will once again teem with life. But instead of journalists turning out stories, the 80,000-square-foot facility will house youngsters learning their ABCs, their state capitals and their multiplication tables.
In the section of the building where printing presses once stood, a gymnasium will hold basketball courts and work-out equipment.
HighMark School Development of Murray, Utah, bought the building for $1.3 million last month, with plans to expand the International Academy of Trenton Charter School, temporarily operating out of the former Blessed Sacrament School on Belleville Avenue.
Part of the SABIS School Network, the school serves students in kindergarten through third grade. Plans call for the addition of one grade a year until the school accommodates the whole range of students from K-12.
The school community is looking for a fall, 2016, completion.
HighMark, founded in 2005 in Salt Lake City, works to develop new and existing charter schools around the country. Its projects in New Jersey include the Vineland Public Charter School and the International Academy of Atlantic City.
The jury is still out on the issue of charter schools versus public schools, with many opponents charging that public funds - already stretched thin - should not be poured into schools that fall outside the public school system's jurisdiction.
Supporters counter that charter school offer a choice to parents dissatisfied with the job their public schools are doing, and that market-driven schools provide better opportunities for children, especially those in inner-city districts.
But wherever you stand on it, the transformation of a high-visibility eyesore into a functioning center of learning has to be good news on many levels.
And from a purely personal point of view, we're psyched that the iconic "Trenton Times" sign will continue to welcome visitors to the city, as it has for so many years.