Labor Day Weekend, September 3-6, 2010

Posted: December 20th, 2010 | Filed under: Out Of Town

Labor Day Weekend in Monmouth County. We sleep and go to the beach in Ocean Grove and eat and drink in neighboring Asbury Park.

Hurricane Earl passed to the east on Friday:

Hurricane Earl, Beach, Ocean Grove, New Jersey, September 3, 2010

But the rest of the weekend was as beautiful as we’ve ever seen it:

Beach, Ocean Grove, New Jersey, September 6, 2010

We watched the remnants of the storm during happy hour on Friday evening from a new place in the Asbury Park Convention Hall building:

AQUA Oceanfront Restaurant & Bar, 1300 Ocean Avenue, Asbury Park Convention Hall, Asbury Park, New Jersey

Then we ate at Brickwall, which is always solid, then had ices at a new Ralph’s on Cookman Avenue and drinks at a new bar on Bond Street.

The boardwalk area in Asbury Park is getting more and more stuff, including another new restaurant. There were fireworks on Saturday.

You’d think that Asbury Park has been hit hard by the economic downturn, and it has, but only somewhat. Esperanza is/was a big project right off the boardwalk that was designed to replace a stalled development, but Esperanza itself stalled around 2008 or so. Today the site looks the same as it once did, just smaller. Here’s what was there in 2004:

Esperanza Site From Boardwalk, Asbury Park, New Jersey, September 4, 2004

Here’s what it looks like today:

Esperanza, Ocean Avenue Between 3rd and 4th Avenues, Asbury Park, New Jersey, September 3, 2010

And off of Cookman Avenue is something I’m labeling the Cookman Avenue Piling Field/Tree Farm:

Piling Field/Tree Farm, Cookman Avenue, Lake Avenue, Heck Street and Grand Avenue, Asbury Park, New Jersey

Some artists have taken to decorating the pilings and using them for site-specific works. The “tree farm” tag comes from a frustrated resident of the neighboring development.

But even with those things, Asbury Park is as busy as we’ve ever seen it. The restaurants were all crowded and people were all over the boardwalk all weekend. I think the key isn’t to rely on large development but rather encourage a critical mass of small businesses. I don’t know if those failed projects were subsidized by taxpayers but if they were, it was a bad deal.

You forget how much Asbury Park has evolved. Here it was the first time I visited, which was only back in 2004 — keep in mind that this was on Saturday afternoon of the Labor Day Weekend:

Asbury Park Boardwalk, Asbury Park, New Jersey, September 4, 2004