By Donald Wittkowski
Ocean City’s welcome mat is a bit soiled.
Three abandoned and blighted former gas stations have marred the appearance of the main entryway into town for years, prompting city officials to take a long, hard look at ways for removing the blight.
Acknowledging that parts of the Ninth Street corridor are in serious need of a makeover, Mayor Jay Gillian held a town hall-style meeting Thursday night to discuss options for beautifying the area from the bay to the Boardwalk.
“We’ve been coming into Ocean City for how many years now and it’s not looked so well,” Gillian said of the three shuttered gas stations.
During the meeting, Gillian repeatedly stressed that he wanted to hear ideas from the public for giving Ninth Street a facelift. He assured the audience that no final decisions have been made.
“There’s nothing devious going on. I just want to know what everybody thinks,” he said.
About 100 people filed into the Ocean City Tabernacle to express their concerns and pitch their suggestions. In all, 20 members of the public spoke during the 75-minute meeting.
Their ideas included new parks, environmentally friendly rain gardens, family attractions, children’s playgrounds, eco-tourism sites, bird-watching areas and boat slips.
But the former gas stations that collectively serve as an ugly focal point of the Ninth Street corridor dominated the discussion. A number of speakers implored the mayor to remove the eyesores.
“Whatever you put in this area has to be a thousand times better than three deteriorated gas stations,” said Craig Stuart, a local resident.
An online survey that allows people to give their suggestions for improving Ninth Street can be found on the city’s website at ocnj.us/survey.
Meanwhile, Gillian and other city officials outlined conceptual plans to replace the blight with an expanse of landscaped open space stretching from the corner of Ninth Street and Bay Avenue to the foot of the Route 52 Causeway bridge.
The city is already in the process of buying one of the gas station sites, an old BP. The run-down remains of the BP station were demolished over the summer. The property is being cleaned up before the city takes ownership.
Talks are being held for the city to acquire the old Getty gas station next to the BP site. The city also has its eye on the Bud’s Outboard Marine Inc. property adjacent to the BP land. Altogether, these three sites would form most of the open space proposed along Ninth Street.
Scott Stiles, whose family has owned Bud’s Outboard Marine since 1981, said the business is for sale. Stiles was one of the speakers at Thursday’s meeting.
In an interview afterward, Stiles noted his family is willing to talk to the city about a deal. However, he stressed that the city would have to pay his family more than the $475,000 that it shelled out to buy the former BP station next door.
“We would need a lot more than that to relocate,” Stiles said, while not specifying a price.
On the opposite side of Ninth Street is an old Exxon gas station that was also targeted by the city for acquisition as open space. But the Ocean City realty firm Keller Williams purchased the Exxon site on Tuesday for $500,000 and plans to redevelop it into a multimillion-dollar office building.
“Our intention is to build a very beautiful building there that will welcome people into Ocean City,” Paul Chiolo, the owner of Keller Williams, said while discussing the project during Thursday’s meeting.
Gillian seemed to endorse the Keller Williams project, indicating that the city no longer has an interest in acquiring the Exxon property.
“Paul’s bought it,” Gillian said of Chiolo. “He’s going to put a beautiful place there.”
The Ninth Street entryway is a hodgepodge of commercial businesses, small office buildings, restaurants, a bus station and even a miniature golf course.
Gillian wants to consider ways for beautifying the entire corridor from the bay to the Boardwalk. For now, the city is concentrating on the stretch from the foot of the Route 52 Causeway bridge to West Avenue. A second phase, to come later, will include Asbury Avenue to the Boardwalk.
“The rest of Ninth Street is rather drab, too,” Hank Glaser, a retired local businessman, said while calling for broader improvements of the corridor.
Tom Heist, an Ocean City insurance broker, said Ninth Street’s appearance has improved in recent years, following the completion of the new Route 52 Causeway.
But Heist also said that Ocean City must continue to spruce up its main artery, especially if it wants to match the entryways of other upscale Cape May County shore towns, such as Avalon, Stone Harbor and Sea Isle City.
“If you can continue with Phase II, we’re going to have an amazing gateway into town,” Heist told the mayor and his representatives.
