TO DIAMOND MAN, BROAD ST. STILL SHINES

Displaced from his longtime storefront, Alan Fisher plans to take over the space now occupied by Papyrus in the red brick structure visible over his left shoulder.

Alan Fisher got his walking papers in late January.

After 25 years operating A.H. Fisher Diamonds at 10 Broad Street, Fisher was notified with just five days remaining on his lease that it wouldn’t be renewed.

Turns out his landlord, Keith Alliotts of Broad Street Realty Associates, has a client on the line who not only wants the storefront at 2 Broad, at the corner of Broad and West Front streets, but the entire 10,000-square-foot structure that stretches several addresses south on Broad.

Alliotts’ client is widely rumored to be Urban Outfitters, though neither the clothing retailer nor Alliotts responded to redbankgreen messages seeking comment.

Fisher says he knows nothing more than the rest of us about who the tenant will be. But the fact that his landlord told him the mystery tenant wants not just 2 and 8 Broad, but Fisher’s space and the private breezeway it abuts will only heighten interest in the prospective deal.

But that’s a story for another day. Today, our topic is Fisher’s decision, in spite of all the mutterings about Red Bank’s purported slide back to the days of ‘Dead Bank,’ to stick with Broad Street.

“I grew up here in town, so yes, this is a vote of confidence in Red Bank,” says Fisher, who in high school and college had a job that required him to wind the clock atop the former borough hall and police station at 51 Monmouth Street.

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