One of the curbside gardens created on Broad Street a year ago. (Photo by John T. Ward. Click to enlarge.)
Downtown promotion agency Red Bank RiverCenter will have some extra green to spend on greenery and other improvements this year, thanks to a $150,000 grant announced Monday.
Also coming: more pretty little twinkly lights over Broadwalk.
More bistro lighting also will be added, RiverCenter said. (Photo by John T. Ward. Click to enlarge.)
The Transformation Grant from Main Street New Jersey will go toward the creation of new flower beds, the expansion of overhead bistro lighting and other projects related to RiverCenter’s management of the town’s special improvement district, the agency said in a press release.
Last month, RiverCenter won council endorsement to create a tiny “parklet,” with benches, plants and trees, at the northwest corner of Monmouth and Broad streets. The $80,000 project adds to a series of lush curbside gardens installed in the district a year ago.
Proceeds of the grant will also go toward enhancement of RiverCenter’s business recruitment and “optimization of our current business operations through a two-year subscription to Placer.ai,” described as “a cutting-edge online service that uses anonymously sourced mobile location data to calculate the number of active cell phones in any locality during a specified time. Placer.ai is a gamechanger that allows users to truly understand their trade area and target market.”
Funds will also be used in partnership with the Count Basie Center for the Arts on a future project focused around its 100th anniversary celebration in 2026.
In the announcement, Rivercenter Executive Director Bob Zuckerman said the grant “provides the perfect mix of placemaking, beautification and economic development tools to truly transform our downtown district.
“Our new plantings and lights will shine and delight the thousands of people who visit downtown Red Bank each year, and the Placer.ai software will help us recruit some great new businesses,” he said. ‘Furthermore, the grant will provide us with the opportunity to partner with the Basie to properly commemorate their 100 years of serving downtown Red Bank with some of the finest arts programs in the nation.”
“We have already seen the incredible beauty that our new plantings brough to our district,” said RiverCenter Board Chair John Anderson, “and by adding more plantings we will make an even greater impact in beautifying our downtown.”
The new lights will be “a magnificent addition,” he said.
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