Sea Isle City Blacktop Promanade
Posted by the Asbury Park Press
By Erik Larsen
The Great Atlantic Storm, a nor’easter notorious for all but leveling Long Beach Island when it barreled across the Shore in March 1962, grabbed the boardwalk and pulled it into the sea.
After that, Sea Isle City officials decided it would be more economical, assuming that future storms would come, to replace its boardwalk with a blacktop promenade that could not be pulled out to sea. It was a page right out of the playbook of the “Three Little Pigs.”
Today, this 2.5-square-mile town with its 1 1/2-mile-long promenade is changing like so many other municipalities up and down the Jersey Shore. There are still lots of shops and tourist traps, but the amusements are gone.
Police cars drive up and down the promenade, keeping guard over the peace.
This is a subdued oceanfront, lined with park benches that are dedicated to and from the ghosts of tourists past. To people like “Mom — Sandy Wright Cartledge, the Peace of the Shore,” or “She Made It To The Beach, 1935 Dee Murray 1999,” or “Pegg Horan, She Loved Sea Isle City.”
For some, the peace and quiet is about right.
“I like Sea Isle in particular. It isn’t fancy, it’s not crazy, it’s not crowded,” said Kimberly Muirrhead, 35, of Pittsburgh, Pa., who was visiting with her three children.
It’s quiet, and the only noise is the sound of the pounding surf against the beach through the trees and shrubs that have grown up between the promenade and the beachfront.
In a sense, there is no boardwalk here. But people like it because they don’t have rides and the noise, it’s more residential, the clubs and attractions have been ripped down, replaced with homes.
“This is an island that is changing to all residential,” said John Petrowsky, 69, of Cherry Hill. “It’s going to become like Spring Lake.”
The stores and shops are built into the ground floor of 10-story high-rises.
Sea Isle City is known for its bars, said Rob Tigro, 22, a resident who works in a shop under one of the high-rises that sells nautical-themed gifts and souvenirs, called Seassom’s Nautical Gifts.
“It (Sea Isle City) used to be known for its rides,” Tigro said.
But the view is immaculate, that’s what matters.
Published: February 13. 2010 4:10AM