By ARIELLA MONTI
This season, city officials believe that a mix of early summer weather and high gas prices have kept beachgoers close, increasing the number of visitors to the area.
“We are very pleased as far as our beach park attendance goes,” said City Manager Charles Theofan.
Last summer the city set records for beach attendance, and this year’s numbers are 22 percent above those for 2007 for Memorial Day weekend through the first day of summer, according to Theofan.
He speculated that there are various reasons for the increase, including the price of gas and some unseasonably hot weather. “I think a lot of people from the city that would otherwise be going to the Hamptons are availing themselves to our beautiful beach,” Theofan said, adding that Nassau County residents who usually spend their summers in the Hamptons may also be staying closer to home.
A partnership between the city and the Long Island Rail Road has played an important role in increasing the number of train riders to Long Beach, Theofan explained. An $18 package that includes a round trip from Penn Station and admission to the beach went on sale before Memorial Day. An off-peak round-trip ticket usually costs $15, and a one-day beach pass is $10.
According to Henery Felton, an LIRR customer sales representative, on the weekends between May 24 and June 16, an estimated 8,900 ticket packages were sold. Felton said that ridership is up in general on all lines, but especially to the beaches.
Manhattan resident Kevin Moeller visits his brothers, Brian and Dennis, who live in separate houses on Maryland Avenue in Long Beach, a couple of times a month. Moeller said he has noticed a significant increase in the number of riders heading to the beach, especially on nice days.
“There are always huge crowds going out there,” he said, adding that most riders head straight from the train station to the boardwalk, while he enjoys the less populated beaches on the West End.
Moeller, who is originally from Westbury, said he has always been a beach lover. “For me, it’s the best of both worlds,” he said. “I have a place in Manhattan and I have a couch — or a spare bedroom — a few blocks away from the water.”
The growing crowds of train riders are not only helping fill the city’s beaches, but giving a boost to local businesses as well. Bobbi Levine, the owner of Pita Grill on West Park Avenue, across from the train station, said she is thrilled with the increase in business. “On nice days you can’t get in here!” she said excitedly. “Lines are out the door.”
Levine, a Long Beach resident, has noticed an increase visitors, especially from New York City, over the past three years.
Dave Schure, co-owner of NY Gourmet Exchange, a new eatery on East Park Avenue that specializes in wraps and is also a short walk from the station, said that his first weekend in business, June 7 and 8, could not have been better. “Droves of people coming off the train came in,” Schure said.
The city is helping to ease traffic, provide better service and help local merchants on the West End by allowing four businesses to sell daily beach passes: Beach Bagel and Deli (at Beech Street and Ohio Avenue), Ballybannon Market Place (Beech and Minnesota), Paninis and Bikinis (Beech and Wyoming) and Lilly’s Corner (Beech and New York). The city sells the passes to the businesses for $9 each, which they in turn sell to the public for $10. The partnership eliminates the ticket booths on the beach and offers people a wider range of times to buy passes.
Other changes the city has made include opening the beach full-time a week early, and turning the restroom facility at Riverside Boulevard into a concession stand.
For more information on the beach, go to longbeachny.org.
Comments about this story? JKellard@liherald.com or (516) 569-4000 ext. 213.
