BELMAR, N.J. (AP) — The mayor of a central New Jersey town is barring nonresidents from entering the community via a major highway — but it’s just a temporary prohibition.
Belmar Mayor Matt Doherty announced the decision in a twitter posted around 3 p.m. Sunday. He says traffic into the town from Route 35 is “shut down immediately” because the Monmouth County community of about 6,000 people has “reached its capacity.” Doherty says the decision was made for public safety reasons.
Thousands of people came to Belmar on Sunday for the concluding day of the 29th annual seafood festival or to hit local beaches.
Doherty says full-time Belmar residents can bypass the road closures by showing their driver’s license.
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I read elsewhere the seafood fest brought in 200,000 over the weekend. For such a tiny town, that is huge.
Yep. When your whole town is effectively a tourist destination, it has a maximum capacity just like any other venue. There are soccer stadiums with more space for visitors than towns like Belmar.
Looking over my shoulder, my wife said, “So visiting Jersey is a little like going to Neiman Marcus’ annual clearance shoe sale, huh?”
She is wise! rotfl
Keep in mind that getting into and out of Belmar is
(1.) ofter done at a crawl during a simply ‘nice’ weekend
(2.) involves crossing bridges where traffic gets squeezed
(3.) can be done via limited number of roads into the town (see#2.)
(4.) becomes sheer insanity on the weekend of the Seafood festival.
“Nobody goes there anymore. It’s too crowded.”
Dunno why but this mayor reminds me of that mayor in Jaws. Maybe I’m just in a cynical mood this morning.
Ah, Mr Mayor, if you don’t want to “reach capacity” in your town, don’t hold the fish fry… Or move the venue.
On CNN just now there was news of a shark attack along the east coast somewhere.