Atlantic City’s newest casino might have some great amenities – and Beyonce -- but there is one amenity guests of the Revel Casino will have to go elsewhere to get this Memorial Day Weekend.
The beach in front of the boardwalk casino will remain closed until at least the end of June for an $8.4-million rehabilitation project, according to New Jersey Department of Environmental Protection spokesman Larry Ragonese.
If the project was delayed to keep the beach open for Revel's first holiday weekend there wouldn’t be much beach left, officials said.
The project needs to be done to ensure that sand put in as part of a massive beach replenishment project by the Army Corps of Engineers is secured and won’t wash away with the next storm and it was delayed due to weather over the winter, according to the DEP.
The seven-block stretch of beach from New Jersey Avenue -- the corner where Revel, the most northern boardwalk casino, begins -- to Vermont Avenue will remain closed throughout the weekend and beyond as crews repair the stone groin -- basically a small jetty used to protect against beach erosion -- at Massachusetts Avenue and put in a wood groin, Ragonese confirmed.
After the work is done in front of the $2.4-billion resort, groin work will be done directly to the north between Victoria and Vermont Avenues.
A Revel spokesman said the resort has no official comment about the closure.
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The beach in front of Revel, “will be open this summer,” Ragonese said. But an exact time still isn’t clear. The DEP says the project is set to be completed by June 28 but weather and other factors could delay things.
The DEP’s Shore Protection Fund is footing 75-percent of the bill for the $8.4 million project while the city is footing the rest.
Other parts of Atlantic City’s beaches will also be inaccessible this Memorial Day because of the ongoing beach replenishment project. As of Thursday about 75 percent of Atlantic City was completed while 25 percent of the beach fill was finished in Ventnor, the DEP said.
The DEP says that all beach fill pumping is expected to wrap June 29. There will still be fencing, plantings and some other work to be done beyond that date, the DEP said.
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