RED BANK: BROADWALK WRAPS UP STORMY SEASON, CHANGES COULD BE ON TAP

By BRIAN DONOHUE

Along Broad Street this week, restaurant workers rolled away the tables and umbrellas where diners spent summer nights eating en plein air on a quiet street closed to traffic.

Borough workers on Tuesday lowered the metal bollards to reopen the three-block stretch dubbed “Broadwalk” to the cars and trucks that will rule the road again until spring.

But this year, more than any of the previous five years of Broadwalk’s existence, debate and discussion over the program’s future will likely continue well into the off-season. At least some changes – from minor tweaks to events programing to larger scheduling changes – appear likely.

“We are open to changes on the Broadwalk,” Mayor Billy Portman said in an email to redbankgreen, reiterating a stance he and several council members have made repeatedly. “We have always said that the Broadwalk is a constantly evolving space. I hope next year that the changes we make will have a positive impact on as many of our local businesses as possible.”

Louis Andrianos (second from left) among a group of business owners at the August # meeting of the Red Bank Mayor and Borough Council. (Photo by Brian Donohue. Click to enlarge.)

Borough Council members, who voted unanimously last year to make Broadwalk an annual event, cite the program as a successful and popular way for the downtown to compete with oceanfront boardwalk towns like Long Branch and Asbury Park.

But complaints about the program, especially its effects on vehicle traffic and customer foot traffic, have been a favorite gripe of critics on social media since it began during the pandemic lockdowns of 2020.

And in August, those concerns burst into real life, with impassioned statements at a council meeting by a group of restaurant owners and the subsequent submission of a 131-signature petition asking for an immediate and permanent end to the closure.

John Yarusi, owner of Johnny’s Pork Roll asks for an end to “fugazi” Broadwalk at a Red Bank Borough council meeting on August 14, 2025.

The signatures represented roughly four dozen downtown businesses, including some within the Broadwalk zone itself.

Supporters of Broadwalk point out the figure represents just a fraction of businesses in the 283-building area covered by Red Bank Rivercenter, the nonprofit organization which runs the downtown business improvement district.

Still, the wording on the petition, circulated by Louis Andrianos, owner of Neapoli Italian Kitchen on Wallace Street, could not have been more clear: “I support ending Broad Walk immediately and permanently,” it read.

Where it gets a bit less clear, however, is in actual conversations with the people who signed it.

In interviews with more than a half-dozen business owners who signed petition – and several more who did not – a far more nuanced picture emerges of how business owners think Broadwalk affects them.

Take Vincent Esposito, for example.

“I don’t have any problem with it,” said Esposito, who owns Via Sposito, located directly on the Broadwalk. “Overall, it helps. “

And yet, Sposito signed the petition. He did so, he said with a shrug, “to make a little noise. Maybe get RiverCenter to take a look at it.”

As for the exact wording on the petition calling for Broadwalk to be ended “immediately and permanently” he said he was kind of too busy getting ready for the dinner rush to ponder the details.

“I didn’t really look at it,” he confesses.

Other signatories showed a similar ambivalence that belied the clear wording of the petition they signed.

A few doors down, at the clothing store Lucki Clover, owner Jackie Rogers signed the petition to end Broadwalk, and got three employees to sign it too.

But asked her opinion of Broadwalk, she said, “We don’t hate it. It’s actually probably good for us.”

She said she signed the petition partly out of sympathy for businesses outside the zone who say it’s siphoning business away from them.

“I feel like it cuts everyone else off,” she said.

Consensus seems elusive even among partners in the same business.

One restaurant owner who asked not to be identified said they refused to sign it, because they see Broadwalk as a necessary move to compete with boardwalk towns. Their partner in the same business did sign, though.

And, notably, there was one suggestion redbankgreen heard over and over: Shortening the May 15 to September 30 season, especially considering the soggy and chilly weather in recent springs.

One owner who signed but asked to remain anonymous, said they think it has brought more visitors to a stretch that in past summers “looked like a Western” referring to Hollywood movie ghost towns with tumbleweeds in the street.

But, “May and June,” they added, “are not necessary at all.”

To be sure, some of those who signed the petition are strongly in favor of exactly what it said at the top of the paper: ending it once and for all.

Mikaela Lucia, owner of the restaurant 26 West on the Navesink, which sits outside the pedestrian zone, credited a boom in the eatery’s catering business with making up for profits lost because of Broadwalk. The success of 26 West was cited by a seemingly perplexed Portman during the council meeting where Andrianos and other spoke in August.

“We are having our best years ever, that is true, but it’s completely unrelated to Broadwalk,” she said. “We are absolutely, and we have always been opposed to Broadwalk.”

As for Andrianos, a week after he submitted the petition, he said he was paid a visit by Red Bank RiverCenter representatives who asked him to resign from his post as treasurer of the agency in response to his tactics.

Andrianos said he refused to step down and defended his actions, adding he had raised his concerns internally and found progress “incredibly slow.” He said he felt it was important to raise the concerns before the pedestrian plaza closed for the season.

“I have zero argument or discourse with RiverCenter, nor do I have discourse with mayor and council,” he said. “This is just a discussion on policy. We’re just having a disagreement on policy, and I think I went about it in a professional manner.”

redbankgreen editor Brian Donohue may be reached via email at [email protected] or by calling or texting 848-331-8331 or yelling his name loudly as he walks by. Do you value the news coverage provided by redbankgreen? Please become a financial supporter if you haven’t already. Click here to set your own level of monthly or annual contribution.