RED BANK: HALLOWEEN PARADE SHINES
Kissed by sunshine and warm weather, the 74th annual Red Bank Halloween Parade drew hundreds of costumed celebrants for a joyful march down Broad Street Sunday.
Check out redbankgreen‘s photos from the parade below.
RED BANK: HALLOWEEN PARADE POSTPONED
The 74th annual Red Bank Halloween Parade, scheduled for Sunday, has been postponed because of rain in the forecast, the Parks and Rec Department announced Friday afternoon.
RED BANK: PORCHFEST ROCKS TOWN
Sunshine, cool weather, beach chairs, bikes and guitars… Red Bank’s first-ever Porchfest music festival “went off as flawlessly as it could” Sunday, said lone mayoral candidate Billy Portman.
The five-hour festival, which Portman organized with HABcore executive Marta Quinn as a fundraiser for the housing nonprofit, put more than 80 musical acts on 22 porches, lawns and driveways across the borough. Each drew an audience, some in the hundreds.
Traveling around to the various porches, yards and driveways, “I just watched it grow as the hours got later,” Portman told redbankgreen.
The event was nonpolitical, Portman said, though “it is completely aligned with what I hope to do more of as a mayor, and that is bring people together, and focus more on our similarities, and less on our differences.” He also hopes to make Porchfest as an annual occurrence, he said.
redbankgreen stopped in at all 22 venues. Here’s some of what we saw; click photos to enlarge.
RED BANK: PORCHFEST TO FILL EARS & HEARTS
An interactive map for the event displays the lineup of acts at each location; click on circled numbers to view. Below, Carlotta Schmidt is among the scheduled artists. (Photo from YouTube. Click to enlarge.)
By JOHN T. WARD
It was not that long ago that Red Bank was a place of large-scale, outdoor music festivals. One needn’t be ancient to recall the sprawling, weekend-long Jersey Shore Jazz & Blues Festival in Marine Park each summer, or the spring-and-fall festivals in the White Street parking lot, both of which went dark this year.
But this Sunday, live, open-air concerts come roaring back to the borough in a new, decentralized model that’s been road-tested elsewhere: Porchfest, a five-hour eargasm of 70 acts spread across town on 21 residential porches, plus 11 more acts at a previously scheduled music fest behind a dentist’s office.
RED BANK: ROMCOM FILMING IN PARK
Film-production trucks lined West Front Street along Riverside Gardens Park in Red Bank Monday morning.
RED BANK: CLASSIC 5K BACK ON THE ROAD
The return the Red Bank Classic 5K after a two-year pandemic hiatus brought out a motley mix of nearly 1,100 runners, wheelchair racers, walkers, muscle flexers and two jogglers Saturday.
Check out redbankgreen’s photos below to see if you recognize any.
RED BANK: RIVERCENTER TAPS DOWNTOWN PRO
Bob Zuckerman has run business-promotion organizations in South Orange, where he’s now an elected official, and Westfield. (Photo by Matt Glass. Click to enlarge.)
By JOHN T. WARD
A downtown-management professional with extensive experience in New York and New Jersey has been tapped to run Red Bank RiverCenter, the organization announced Thursday.
Bob Zuckerman replaces Glenn Carter, the onetime borough planning director who served as RiverCenter’s executive for less than a year prior to his retirement earlier this year.
RED BANK: SPRING FOOD FEST CANCELLED
A shot from the 2015 edition of the event. (Photo by John T. Ward. Click to enlarge)
[See UPDATE below]
By JOHN T. WARD
Red Bank won’t be hosting the annual International Beer, Wine & Food Festival scheduled for May 15 because of “left-over Covid issues,” the event’s organizer said Tuesday.
RED BANK: 5K RACE, SYMPHONY TO RETURN
After being mothballed for two years by the COVID-19 pandemic, two events that bring in thousands of visitors to Red Bank are slated to return this summer.
The Red Bank Classic 5K and the New Jersey Symphony concert in Marine Park are among events filling up a calendar wiped clean in 2020 and only partly refilled in 2021.
RED BANK: THOUSANDS PACK OYSTERFEST
Sunny and cool weather provided ideal conditions for the return of the Red Bank RiverCenter-hosted Guinness Oyster Festival Sunday.
After a missed year due to the COVID-19 pandemic, this year’s 11th edition saw fewer local restaurants owing to staffing shortages. But thousands of attendees packed the White Street parking lot, waited patiently in lines for food and drinks, and partied with friends in front of two stages as in the past.
Were you there? Look for yourself and your friends in redbankgreen‘s beaucoup photos below. (Photos by John T. Ward. Click to enlarge.)
RED BANK: SUN TO SHINE ON OYSTERFEST
Likely to be the biggest bash Red Bank has seen since the start of the COVID-19 pandemic, the Guinness Oyster Festival is set to return for a skipped-year 11th edition Sunday.
Here’s some helpful information for those planning to attend, including a lookahead at the forecast.
RED BANK: STREET FAIR RETURNS
Sunday’s Street Fair in downtown Red Bank, a fundraiser for the borough’s volunteer fire department, drew thousands of attendees to Monmouth and Broad streets.
RED BANK: BOARD TAPS BOWERS-CRADER
Samantha Bowers-Crader with her father, John Bowers, at the Mayor’s Ball in 2018. (Photo by John T. Ward. Click to enlarge)
By JOHN T. WARD
Red Bank RiverCenter‘s new chairperson is filling a seat held three decades ago by her father.
RED BANK: CARTER TO LEAD RIVERCENTER
Glenn Carter and OceanFirst Bank’s Robin Fitzmaurice at the Mayor’s Ball at the Oyster Point Hotel in 2018. (Photo by John T. Ward. Click to enlarge)
By JOHN T. WARD
A familiar face has been hired to run Red Bank RiverCenter, the downtown promotion organization: former borough planning director Glenn Carter.
RED BANK: KIRKPATRICK QUITS RIVERCENTER
Laura Kirkpatrick addressing the Red Bank council in March, 2020. (Photo by John T. Ward. Click to enlarge)
[See UPDATE below]
By JOHN T. WARD
For the second time in just 17 months, the downtown promotion organization Red Bank RiverCenter is losing its executive director.
After just one, pandemic-filled year, Laura Kirkpatrick has resigned as operational head of the agency that manages the borough’s special improvement district, redbankgreen has learned.
RED BANK: WHAT’S ON COUNCIL AGENDA
Among the many events organizers hope to bring back in 2021: the Red Bank Classic 5k, slated for June 19. A list of event dates is up for approval by the council. (Photo by John T. Ward. Click to enlarge.)
By JOHN T. WARD
Red Bank’s borough council meets with a busy agenda of financing actions, hirings and more Wednesday.
There’s also something missing, though numerous commenters have demanded it: changes to the meeting protocol covering… public comment.
RED BANK: HALLOWEEN PARADE DELIGHTS
It’ll go down as the pandemic parade, but the 73rd annual Red Bank Halloween Parade held Sunday was a delight for hundreds of kids and kids at heart.
Check out redbankgreen‘s photos from the event below
RED BANK: HALLOWEEN PARADE SLATED
The annual Red Bank Halloween Parade is on for Sunday, October 25, though COVID-19 will take a bite out of the festivities. (Photo by John T. Ward. Click to enlarge.)
RED BANK: PARK CONCERTS CANCELLED
Two weeks after they were announced, six paid-admission concerts over the next two Saturdays in Red Bank’s Riverside Gardens Park have been cancelled.
RED BANK: FOOD FESTS OUT, CONCERTS IN
The Weeklings, who’ve performed at past food festivals in town, will get a starring slot at a concert in Riverside Gardens Park. (Photo by John T. Ward. Click to enlarge.)
By JOHN T. WARD
The sun has set on the possibility that downtown Red Bank will host one or maybe even two food festivals this autumn.
Instead, business promotion agency RiverCenter has put six outdoor concerts on the district’s dance card – but you’ll have to pay to attend.
RED BANK: NEW LOT, HOURS ON AGENDA
The plan calls for a new parking lot on the former site of the Marine Park tennis courts. (Image by CME Associates. Click to enlarge.)
By JOHN T. WARD
A new parking lot in Red Bank’s Marine Park is among the topics slated for discussion by the council Wednesday night.
So is an issue put on hold five months ago: increasing the hours of paid parking downtown.
FAIR HAVEN: FIREMEN’S FAIR CANCELED
The traditional summer-ending Fair Haven Firemen’s Fair has been canceled, volunteer fire company President Jim Cerruti announced Tuesday.
RED BANK: TWO FALL FESTIVALS? MAYBE…
The annual Guinness Oyster Fest in September could be followed just three weeks later by the International Beer, Wine & Food Fest, usually held in April. (Photo by John T. Ward. Click to enlarge.)
By JOHN T. WARD
With a calendar decimated by the COVID-19 crisis, Red Bank appears to be in for an unusually quiet summer.
But as summer edges into autumn, two of the town’s largest annual food festivals could occur within three weeks of one another, redbankgreen has learned.
Here’s a lookahead at the pandemic’s impacts on the summer calendar.
RED BANK: RIVERCENTER TAPS KIRKPATRICK
Laura Kirkpatrick addressing the Red Bank council Wednesday night. (Photo by John T. Ward. Click to enlarge)
By JOHN T. WARD
Laura Kirkpatrick has been named executive director of Red Bank RiverCenter, the semi-autonomous agency that manages the borough’s special improvement district.
RED BANK: BALLOONS, TRAFFIC ON AGENDA
The study is to examine traffic and on-street parking downtown. (Photo by John T. Ward. Click to enlarge.)
By JOHN T. WARD
Expect the Red Bank council to initiate a proposed ban on mass balloon releases at its next regular meeting Wednesday night.
Also on deck: the award of a contract for a traffic study.