City Manager: Beach Expected to Open Next Summer

While the beach in Long Beach suffered tremendous erosion during Hurricane Sandy, the city expects Ocean Beach Park will reopen next summer, although the fate of the boardwalk remains in limbo.

That’s what City Manager Jack Schnirman told Patch after a special City Council meeting Tuesday afternoon, the government body’s first public meeting after the storm crippled the beach town Oct. 29.

Work crews are sifting through and cleaning a mountain of sand at the Superblock on East Broadway that the force of the hurricane washed from the beach and onto the city streets and neighborhoods.

Like Long Beach Patch on Facebook.

“It needs to be approved by the Environmental Conservation Department before it can be put back on the beach,” Schnirman said about the sand.  

The city must also undertake a beach replenishment project, he said, and city officials are already starting to talk about that project with various levels of government.

The boardwalk suffered significant damage overall, but that the eastern half of the structure was particularly hard hit, the city manager reported.

“At the eastern half of the boardwalk there was catastrophic destruction, and in the west there was very severe damage,” Schnirman said.

He emphasized that it is premature to say precisely how and when the boardwalk should be rehabilitated, but that that goal is to build it better than it was before.

“We’re working with our insurance folks, FEMA, with all kinds of engineers to have a conversation about putting together a plan - short, medium and long-term – and about what kind of progress can we see for next season, and what kind of boardwalk do we want,” he said. “We know we have to build it back strong, smarter and safer.”

Be a Follower. Explore and subscribe to Patch groups.