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To the Editor, Asbury Park Sun:

The two year saga of the membership pool club on the North end of the Boardwalk may be coming to a conclusion. The public has mounted a brave defense to prevent an exclusionary and environmentally unsound application from being approved. The NJDEP refused the argument that the CAFRA permit (from 2002 and pre-hurricane Sandy) was outdated. And the applicant refused the “good neighbor” entreaties supported by many hundreds of residents and others who support responsible development on the waterfront.

Negotiations between the parties are coming to a head. The question remains; will the residents of the city end up with something we can live with or are we helpless to determine our own future? Are we locked into 200 acres of development designed for tourists and visitors bringing cars, noise and elitist behavior?

On March 18 there was a Planning Board subcommittee meeting with the redeveloper to come to a compromise over the remaining concerns raised by the public. At that meeting the city’s appointed representatives completely missed the mark. It was supposed to be a final attempt to sway the developer to modifying the design. These final issues had to do with how the structure would look from the outside. Did the developer have to treat all four sides as public facing frontages? Would the subcommittee allow the developer to erect a 200 foot wall, 7.5 feet high along the boardwalk? Is it a mostly bare wall with no amenities? Would they allow two story blank walls on the North and the South without any ornamentation? Not even murals?

From the first moment of that meeting on Jan 25, the attorney for IStar took control. She proposed two solutions. The first involved changing the planks of the wall along the boardwalk from vertical to horizontal. The second had to do with placing murals, interspersed, on this wall. What? What about the FRONTAGE issue? Wasn’t the boardwalk a public space? Weren’t the sides that face Green Acres property public? Couldn’t, wouldn’t they do something to these bulwarks to at least make them more friendly? We didn’t want this club built in the first place and now we may have to look at an ugly affront to our city. Maybe so. After 30 minutes the subcommittee agreed they liked horizontal planks and there was no discussion about the North and South walls.

The application now returns to the entire Planning Board. On Apr 5 the subcommittee will report on the meeting with the redeveloper. Will there be more discussion among Board members or will the public be allowed to speak? It’s not clear so be sure to ZOOM in on the meeting on Apr 5 at 7PM.

Pam Lamberton

Asbury Park

[This letter represents the opinion of its writer and is not representative of any opinion of the Asbury Park Sun staff. All readers are welcome to submit Letters to the Editor to news@asburyparksun.com for our consideration. For guidelines on letter-writing and submission, click here.]

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