Common Sense For Belmar

They must be dune grass!

I received an email from a reader who happens to have a masters in coastal management from a very well known state university:

Good evening,

Thought this might be of interest to the blog. Apparently, the town decided to plant dune grass in near the entrance ramps of the board walk. See attached photos. Instead of investing in a protective natural dune system, they are wasting money on landscaping fixtures that will likely not survive. Much like the palm trees they used to plant there. The sand in areas where dune grass is planted needs to be deep enough to retain moisture. Dune grass is amazing in that the root systems can support 25 foot dunes. I tend to think this grass will die from either not having enough sustained moisture in the sand its planted in or just because its in a high foot traffic area. A waste.

Of note, I did see new plantings north of Taylor Pavilion on the east side of the boards, but the dunes are very close to the boardwalk. This is clearly a beautification move because dunes that close to a structure will provide little to no protection, but to be fair that section of the beach is wider and has a higher elevation.

1:00 yesterday.  Lunch at Federico’s.

Thanks to the reader who sent this in!

It was mentioned to me recently that right around the time someone decided it would be a good idea to have a banquet hall right above Taylor, Merri-Makers was badly in need of a new waterfront wedding venue.  Did a little research into it and found out it was true.

Looks like the Botts learned in 2011 that 2012 would be their last year at the Waters Edge in Sea Bright:

Then Sandy hit, making things very difficult for the Botts and their customers:

Very difficult:

Meanwhile at the exact same time this was going on, Belmar was laying plans for a beachfront wedding hall.  Hard to believe this was a coincidence.

This morning I dug down deep into the dark recesses of the Common Sense for Belmar archives and found tapes of a presentation architect Gregg Sonnenfeld made to the Boardwalk Committee on June 20, 2013.  The discussion about Taylor and the wedding hall begins at the 21:45 mark of the first tape.  Found it to be pretty interesting in light of what we now know.

When Taylor was finally completed as a single story banquet hall Merri-Makers was the only one to bid for the food concession lease.