In an effort to preserve beachfront parking and save on construction costs, Sea Bright officials are retooling plans for municipal facilities.

Sea Bright officials appear to be retreating from an ambitious plan to remake the waterbound borough’s public facilities and beachfront.

Today’s Asbury Park Press, citing Mayor Maria Fernandes, reports that the borough council has “decided not to construct a municipal building on the Peninsula House lot, just south of the Chapel Beach Club.”

Instead, it is proposing the use of the current borough hall lot at Ocean Avenue and Center Street, Fernandes said, to save efforts in seeking approval of construction from the state Department of Environmental Protection.

The council initially proposed a two-story municipal facility on the beachfront lot. It would have housed the Police Department and possibly the Municipal Court.

Rebuilding on the current borough hall property will also save parking for beachgoers, Fernandes said. Some visitors to the proposed borough hall at the current site will have to park up the block and walk to the facility because the parking lot there is small, Fernandes said.

The Press says that the council “wants more time to consider the reconfiguration of the proposed municipal facilities, and that “ideas that were previously discussed at Smart Growth workshops and council meetings have shifted and are being tweaked.”

Approval of a layout of the buildings on the beachfront lot between the Chapel Beach Club and Donovan’s Reef may come at the council’s April 15 meeting, the Press says.

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