By MADDY VITALE
Walking along a busy Boardwalk in Ocean City on Saturday, bicycles zip by, people munch on candy and pizza and some businesses begin to open up. Life is slowly returning to the new normal — but not quite.
Looming above the Boardwalk, a towering blue rollercoaster with tight twists and turns – the Gale Force – has yet to give thrillseekers a rush this summer.
And like the rollercoaster at Playland’s Castaway Cove at 11th Street and the Boardwalk, the rest of the amusement rides are either shrink-wrapped, covered or just not operating.
At Sixth Street and the Boardwalk, Gillian’s Wonderland Pier would typically see families stream in while kids giggle on toy cars, frog rides and the iconic carousel. But all of the rides are ghostly quiet now. A new amusement called the Frisbee also has no riders.
Until Gov. Phil Murphy says amusement parks and arcades are allowed to reopen again — after COVID-19 shuttered a host of activities — families will just have to stroll by these two amusement parks.
Brian Hartley, vice president of Playland’s Castaway Cove, and Gillian’s Wonderland Pier owner, Ocean City Mayor Jay Gillian, say the time is now to reopen.
“We have everything lined up and ready to go,” Hartley said in an interview at Castaway Cove. “But we wait by the phone and, sadly, the longer it goes, the kids start to look somewhere else to make money.”
Hartley explained that amusement park operators are in a holding pattern.
“Every day I answer calls from people asking if we are opened or when we will open,” he said. “At this point, we will be lucky to open by Fourth of July. Basically, the goal is to financially survive until 2021.”
Each week, Hartley, Gillian and other members of the New Jersey Amusement Association call in to speak to the governor or other high-ranking state officials to discuss the next steps in the reopening process.
This past week, Murphy allowed go-carts and miniature golf to reopen, but not amusement rides, arcades or water parks.
“At this point this is just devastating to the amusement industry,” Gillian emphasized. “A lot of people depend on us to reopen. They have traditions. We all have big hearts and understand what some people have gone through, but it is time to safely reopen and let people begin to put their lives back together.”
Amusement operators say the governor has not given an estimated time to reopen. They also say that they have all of the safeguards in place to strictly adhere to the CDC guidelines, from sanitizing stations, to washing off the rides and hard surfaces, as well as wearing all of the PPE as instructed.
They say they are prepared. But without the go-ahead from the governor, training is pushed back, people are going elsewhere to find work and the financial loss could be catastrophic, they said.
Both Hartley and Gillian said there is no question that amusement parks add to all of the other attractions that make Ocean City a destination for families. But the parks, including OC Water Park, arcades such as Jilly’s Arcade, go-carts, miniature golf and other entertainment, create the complete picture of “America’s Greatest Family Resort.”
“There is no question that Playland’s and Gillian’s are major attractions. We both do it safe. We both do it right,” Gillian noted.
This is the first year that Gillian could recall that Wonderland Pier was closed.
“This is the first Easter, the first Memorial Day, that I have been home,” he noted of what typically kicks off the busy summer tourism season.
Amusement parks aren’t the only businesses feeling the pain of the closure. OC Water Park at Seventh Street and the Boardwalk did not appear Saturday to have a drop of water on the slides that launch visitors into the pools below.
Jody Levchuk, co-owner of the Jilly’s Boardwalk shops, said it is time to reopen the arcades. Levchuk won election as the city’s Third Ward councilman in May and will take office in July.
Jilly’s Arcade at 11th and the Boardwalk has been closed since the COVID-19 state shutdown began in March, like the rest of the amusements. At this point, Levchuk pointed out, he is more than prepared to offer a safe experience for visitors.
“The doors are wide open. I have a 60-foot-wide entrance and it is easy to socially distance,” he said. “We plan to pass out gloves to anyone who doesn’t have them and make sure everyone who enters is wearing a face covering.”
He added to the notion that all of the businesses – competitors or not – thrive by being attractions that entice vacationers to the Boardwalk.
“The businesses depend on each other,” Levchuk said. “If an amusement park is shuttered, it is not good. The governor’s office needs to understand the viability an open amusement park brings to the Boardwalk.”
Ocean City Regional Chamber of Commerce Executive Director Michele Gillian, Jay Gillian’s wife, said in an interview that she, along with other local business representatives, routinely teleconference with the governor’s office and members of the state Legislature.
“Every time the governor has been asked about amusements and other businesses, he does not address them,” Michele Gillian noted. “We have been lobbying since the day it started and our efforts go unnoticed.”
The Chamber of Commerce recently sent out a notice seeking petitioners to support the reopening of the amusements and other attractions that remain closed under the governor’s executive orders.
To view the petition visit https://www.change.org/p/new-jersey-governor-phil-murphy-urge-nj-governor-phil-murphy-to-open-our-amusements-now
