RED BANK: APARTMENTS ON AGENDA, AGAIN
After three years of review and changes, a proposal for 45 new apartments on Monmouth Street in Red Bank may get an up-or-down vote by the zoning board Thursday night.
RED BANK: SNACK BAR, SCREENS ON AGENDA
The council won’t renew the lease on the snack stand at Riverside Gardens Park under a measure on Wednesday’s agenda. (Photo by John T. Ward. Click to enlarge.)
By JOHN T. WARD
After several years as a seasonal commercial operation, the concession stand in Red Bank’s Riverside Gardens Park has proven to be a fiscal dud.
So suggests a proposal to nix an extension of the soon-to-expire lease on the building. That, along with an ordinance tightening up the property maintenance law governing lawns and window screens, is among the items of interest up for consider at for the council’s regular session Wednesday.
Here’s a quick rundown.
RED BANK: WHAT’S ON THE COUNCIL AGENDA?
The track at Count Basie Fields would be replaced under a plan up for adoption by the council. (Photo by John T. Ward. Click to enlarge.)
By JOHN T. WARD
A proposed alternate-side parking ordinance is up for consideration at the Red Bank council’s only regular session this month.
Also on the agenda as the council moves into its summer meeting schedule: taxes, a new track for Count Basie Fields, the settlement of a disputed records request and more. More →
LITTLE SILVER: NEFF TROUNCES BRANDT
Mayor Bob Neff embraces his wife and twin daughters as early results were announced at a backyard party. (Photo by John T. Ward. Click to enlarge.)
By JOHN T. WARD
Little Silver Mayor Bob Neff easily won the first, not to mention oddest, Republican primary the borough has seen in decades Tuesday.
By more than a 2-1 margin, Neff held off a challenge from first-time candidate Rick Brandt in a race in that saw Brandt banned from firehouses and schools over his campaign’s unauthorized use of photos.
RED BANK: RIVERVIEW WINS RIVER SIGN OK
Riverview Medical Center as seen from the Navesink River in 2017. (Photo by John T. Ward. Click to enlarge.)
By JOHN T. WARD
New signage marking Red Bank’s only hospital as ‘Hackensack Meridian Health Riverview Medical Center’ will include an illuminated sign on the Navesink River side of the facility, under a decision by the zoning board Thursday night.
RED BANK: TOWNHOMES, SIGNS ON AGENDA
An architect’s drawing of the townhomes proposed for Boat Club Court, and a view of the site, below. (Rendering by Rotwein+Blake. Photo by John T. Ward. Click to enlarge.)
By JOHN T. WARD
A plan for townhouses on a twice-abandoned site and a request for large exterior wall signs at Riverview Medical Center fill up the Red Bank zoning board agenda for Thursday night. More →
RED BANK: TWO D.I.Y. SIGN SHOPS OPEN
Joanna Rapuzzi in her newly opened AR Workshop, at 43A Broad Street. (Photo by John T. Ward. Click to enlarge.)
By JOHN T. WARD
Do-it-yourself rustic signmaking is now the latest thing in downtown Red Bank, with the recent openings of two franchised workshops downtown.
RED BANK: SIGNS OF CHURN DOWNTOWN
Sonya Cashner plans to open Broad & Brush at 26 Monmouth Street, one of two similar shops coming to town this summer. (Photo by John T. Ward. Click to enlarge.)
By JOHN T. WARD
Two businesses that offer do-it-yourself instruction in making rustic signs plan to open in downtown Red Bank this summer.
Yeah, that’s a thing, apparently, part of what one of the new contenders calls a trend in “farmhouse decor.”
Read all about that, and more of course, in this custom handcrafted edition of redbankgreen‘s Retail Churn.
RED BANK: STREET ART CLEARS RED TAPE
Works by Brooklyn-based street artist Elle were installed in Red Bank Tuesday on the Anderson building, above, and the Buff Building at 25 Bridge Avenue, right, both owned by the Metrovation real estate development firm.
RED BANK: STREET ART GETS QUALIFIED OK
Street artist Elle, at left, with Metrovation’s Amanda Cheslock as Elle created a mural at the Anderson Building on May 1. (Photo by Trish Russoniello. Click to enlarge)
By JOHN T. WARD
Red Bank’s transit hub may be getting a fresh splash of color from a well-known street artist.
Actually, three splashes, though it’s already got one: an on-the-spot piece that went up a bit prematurely earlier this month, at least by borough government standards.
RED BANK: KAYAKER’S DEATH INSPIRES ALERT
A new water-safety sign was installed Wednesday at Red Bank’s Maple Cove, a popular Navesink River put-in spot for kayakers and canoeists.
With the help of Councilwoman Cindy Burnham, the sign was donated by the parents of David Civile, right, a 26-year-old Tinton Falls man who disappeared while kayaking in the Shrewsbury River off Little Silver in November, 2010. His remains were found two years later.
Signs donated by the David P. Civile Foundation for Boating Safety Awareness have also been installed in Little Silver, Fair Haven, Rumson and elsewhere in Monmouth County.
Read more about the foundation’s efforts here. (Photo above by John T. Ward. Click to enlarge)
SHREWSBURY: ENOUGH SIGNS FOR YOU?
A view east along Patterson Avenue on November 17, above, and again on Wednesday morning, below, when a motorist was pulled over for speeding. (Photo by John T. Ward. Click to enlarge)
By JOHN T. WARD
A recent $640,000 refurbishment of Patterson Avenue in Shrewsbury included new drainage, pavement, crosswalks, traffic calming features and signage.
Lots of signage. Too much signage, in the view of some residents and officials.
A profusion of chartreuse signage created, in the words of Mayor Donald Burden, “that Las Vegas Strip effect.”
RED BANK: KAYAKER’S MOM URGES VEST USAGE
One of the signs that Joan Civile has offered to the town as part of a campaign inspired by the death of her son, David, below. (Click to enlarge)
By JOHN T. WARD
Four years after a Tinton Falls man disappeared while kayaking in the Shrewsbury River off Little Silver, his mother is on a campaign to ensure nothing like that happens again.
David Civile was 26 years old, “in great shape,” and excited about the kayak he’d purchased just three weeks earlier, his mother, Joan Civile, told the Red Bank council Monday night. The November morning that he put in at Little Silver Point Road, he’d just purchased waterproof pants.
“He just thought he was safe,” she recalled. “He said, ‘Mom, I’m in a river. If it’s bad, I’ll just come back.'”
SIDEWALK SIGNS OK FOR ANOTHER YEAR
Sandwich board signs are are here to stay at least for another year. Though there have been some ‘issues’ of merchants posting signs away from their stores to get better visibility, Red Bank Mayor Pasquale Menna says the signs, permitted by ordinance in July 2010, have been a success, and the borough council this week extended the expiration of the ordinance to December 31, 2012. (Click to enlarge)
MENNA TAKES ON STICKER SHOCK
Signs downtown have been plastered with stickers, particularly those touting Red Bank businesses, Mayor Pasquale Menna says. (Photo by Dustin Racioppi; click to enlarge)
By DUSTIN RACIOPPI
Mayor Pasquale Menna has a message for certain businesses in town: Your days of free advertising on Red Bank property are numbered.
He says borough-owned signs particularly parking signs downtown have become inundated with stickers, many of them touting local businesses.
“It’s becoming increasingly prevalent,” he said. “It’s not fair, it’s unsightly, it’s an environmental issue and it’s a quality of life issue.”
Menna wants to do something about. At last week’s council meeting, he suggested that the borough create an ordinance that requires whatever entity that can be traced to the “graffiti” remove it in a timely fashion or face a penalty of some sort.
MORE 4-WAY STOPS PLANNED
Four-way stops would be created at the intersections of Pearl and Chestnut streets and one block north, at Pearl and Oakland streets.
Encouraged by the four-way stop created earlier this year at Bridge Avenue and Chestnut Street, Red Bank is planning a couple of additional foursomes.
Mayor Pasquale Menna nudged the idea into gear at Monday night’s bimonthly council meeting, saying residents in the area of Pearl Street between Oakland and Chestnut streets had asked for the change in their neighborhood, too.