With Memorial Day Weekend 2019 now behind us, the summer season has officially begun here at the Jersey Shore.

This past Friday, I was at our Seaside Park boardwalk studio broadcasting live, and I saw a number of things that caught my attention, both positively and negatively.

Here are 3 things that I noticed, that had both good and bad aspects:

1) The new dunes

Seaside Park's new dunes (Photo by Justin Louis)
Seaside Park's new dunes (Photo by Justin Louis)
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Months ago we had heard that the new sand dunes in Seaside Park transformed the space between the beach and boardwalk, including our studio's perfect view of the Atlantic Ocean.

Bad - When you look out of our front door now, you do indeed see a wall of sand instead of an unobstructed view of the ocean.

Good - Of course, the whole point of the dunes are to protect beach erosion on the ocean side and to protect against flooding on the boardwalk side, so taking a bigger-picture view of the dunes does put that into perspective.

Also, they've done a nice job of building new ramps to the beach that offer access to all and have benches at the top where you can sit and enjoy the view from above.

 

2) The weather

Seaside Park & Heights - Friday, May 24th, 2019 (Photo by Justin Louis)
Seaside Park & Heights - Friday, May 24th, 2019 (Photo by Justin Louis)
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After a long winter of totally uneven weather, both temperature and precipitation-wise, who knows what we should expect for summer 2019.

Bad - Man, was it windy on Friday! Like, epic wind.

I'd brought the WOBM drone with me to the beach with the intention of getting some aerial video to kick off the 2019 summer season, but there was zero chance that I was going to fly on Friday. Skycam 927 would have become Seacam 927 pretty quickly.

Good - It was gorgeous aside from that, though. Take the wind out of it, and the bright sun with temperatures in the mid-70s with low humidity at least made it so that it wasn't a cold, biting wind.

Give me a full summer of that and I'll be a happy camper!

 

3) The people

Seaside Park parking lot (Photo by Justin Louis)
Seaside Park parking lot (Photo by Justin Louis)
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As always, the push and pull of tourism dollars vs. a lack of common courtesy make welcoming out-of-towners to the Shore a mixed blessing.

Bad - I will start by saying that I don't know the physical situation of the driver of the car above, so I shouldn't be so quick to judge. But, I'm sure I wasn't the only one who was a bit perplexed by seeing a quarter-of-a-million dollar-plus McLaren parked in a handicapped spot.

Also, that beach smoking ban? A lot of people either don't know or don't care.

Good - There were a lot of people at the Shore all day long. We know that there will always be a few people who stand out and make Bennys look bad. But, in general, the people I encountered were friendly. That, and they were plentiful.

Usually, it's pretty quiet when I get to the beach studio around 2:30 p.m. on Friday afternoons. But there was a steady stream of people all day long. Hopefully, it's a trend that will continue through the summer of 2019.

Yes, a lot of people means more competition for parking spots, more crowds on the beaches and boardwalks, but it also means more money coming into Ocean County which, in the end, is a good thing!

 

The takeaway

There will always be the bad with the good, but what matters is if the good outweighs the bad. And, so far, I'd say that the good parts of my first impressions of the summer 2019 season here in Ocean County definitely outweighed the few bad things.

 

What do you think?

Summer 2019 is still young, what are your early impressions? Stop by our Facebook page and let us know your thoughts!

 

 

The opinions expressed in this article are solely those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the opinions of 92.7 WOBM, Townsquare Media, its employees, or advertisers.

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