Blogfinger

The old road to an OG parking solution. Paul Goldfinger photo of a road less travelled…so far.

By Paul Goldfinger, MD.  Editor at Blogfinger.net,  Ocean Grove’s only news and opinion source. OG had a newspaper for many years, but it folded around 2000.

Here is a Blogfinger report  about a similar Neptune parking  meeting  in December, 2017.  You can see where this issue has been:

2017 Township parking meeting.

Here is some parking background from a June 2021  Blogfinger article.

2021 parking post.

NOW JANUARY 2023—You may recall our repeated concern, ignored by everyone, that this town has too many cars for the number of spaces in season.   In other words, something needs to be done about unbridled tourism inside this small residential town.   Other towns have done so including Bradley Beach, Belmar, Spring Lake and, believe it or not, Asbury Park, although AP is becoming like a big zoo in season, parking in the Grove and walking or biking into AP.

Now the OGHOA has posted a new “pilot proposal” to provide parking permits on a trial basis in the most vulnerable area of the Grove, over by the border with Asbury Park.

To see the map with colors, click below.

RPPP-Pilot-Proposal-for-012823-Meeting (dragged)

There will be two zones, one is year round  (Zone 1. light blue on the map)  while the other is for prime season. (5/15-9/15.  Zone 2.  green on the map)

You can download the entire program by clicking here:

OGHOA.org

The credit for this proposal is being given to all the major organizations in town including the CMA.   The CMA has, in the past, been very resistant to such a program although they have supported a related plan which would place 3 hour metered parking in the business district.

The announcement sent out by email says that the Township Committee is presenting a “special meeting” on this subject on Saturday, January 28, at 9 am in the Jersey Shore Arts Center.  That email gives credit to Deputy Mayor Tassie York, the 2022 Parking Task Force, OGHOA,  OG Chamber of Commerce, and the Better Parking Alliance.

They also mention  “OG Resident Shane Martins.”  It is unusual to find an individual on such a list, but Shane Martins is a lawyer who also is involved with the activist group, currently under cover, called “Neptune United.”

Blogfinger had the opportunity to speak to him several months ago when he mentioned that he had designed a foolproof permit parking plan for the town.  We did not see his plan then, but could this currently announced plan be his?  If so, perhaps only he should get credit.  The others on the list have been failures in the past with regard to permit parking.

Blogfinger has been preaching about permits  literally for years without any response from players on the list.

At any rate it’s good to know that the residents of OG will finally be given some special treatment to help with their chronic parking woes.

The Committee meeting on Jan. 28 will be interesting since the Committee has been indifferent regarding this issue in the past, with promises made but none kept.  But now they have slipped one of their own, Ms. York, into the mix. She is getting credit as a leader of the current plan. What did she do?

But the Township has been worried about giving special treatment to the Grove while “neglecting” the people of Neptune proper. Even the CMA’s Michael Badger has voiced a similar concern suggesting that no parking plan for the Grove should exclude Neptuners  who need to park at the beach.  A bus shuttle program is currently being worked out.

It will also be interesting to see if the majority of Grovers, those excluded from the RPPP, will have something to say about this matter.   Over at the South End of the Grove, residents will tell you that they also are victimized by freeloader Asburians.  At a  prior town meeting, it appeared that about half of Grovers were opposed  to permit parking.

BEATLES:   “Day Tripper.”