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On Saturday, March 22, members of the Rebuild by Design team and Asbury Park community leaders will lead a participatory parade from the west side of the city to the east side, according to a news release from event organizers.

During the “Rebuild One City” parade, new strategies to protect Asbury Park from future storms and other threats to community resilience will be highlighted along the route, which starts from St. Stephens AME Zion Church at noon and ends at the Langosta Lounge, symbolically uniting Asbury Park’s west side and east side communities, the release stated.

Following the parade, a reception at Langosta Lounge, which was heavily damaged by Sandy and later rebuilt, will showcase Asbury Park’s post-Sandy resilience.

Hands-on activities and physical installations that address the everyday and long-term opportunities and vulnerabilities revealed by Sandy and the solutions proposed by the design teams for greater resiliency against future storms will be featured at the reception. Monmouth University will present audio excerpts from their Hurricane Sandy Oral History Project and residents will be able to find their homes on flood and watershed maps.

The Surfrider Foundation and American Littoral Society will give away native coastal plants that typically help form a line of defense against storm surges on the beach, providing another symbolic connection between residents throughout the city and the shore.

The events are part of a regional series of public programs called “Scale it Up” which is associated with the Rebuild by Design competition and hosted by the Van Alen Institute.

“’Scale it Up’ programs make the strategies emerging from Rebuild by Design tangible and engaging to the general public, and illustrate how design solutions can be ‘scaled up’ or applied to communities throughout the Sandy-affected region,” said David van der Leer, executive director of Van Alen Institute, said in the release.

Rebuild by Design is an initiative of President Obama’s Hurricane Sandy Rebuilding Task Force and the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development that tasks visionary planners and designers to develop innovative, implementable, and replicable strategies to rebuild communities throughout the region. In addition to Asbury Park, “Scale It Up” programs will be conducted in Far Rockaway, the Lower East Side and Staten Island in New York, and in Bridgeport, Conn.

The parade starts at noon from St. Stephens AME Zion Church, located at 1001 Springwood Ave., and ends at the Langosta Lounge restaurant, 1000 Ocean Ave. The reception at Langosta Lounge takes place from 2 to 4 p.m.

Click here to access previous Sun stories about the Rebuild by Design initiative in Asbury Park.

[Above rendering taken from the Rebuild by Design website.]

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