Dayton Boulevard is the socioeconomic lifeline of Red Bank, as the only artery running the six-mile length of a one-mile-wide city. The stark contrast of Red Bank’s vibrant economic past and its low-key present can be read easily in the service-dominated businesses intermingled with dark storefronts and obsolete properties.  A stubborn, decades-long economic malaise and subsequent cultural stagnation are causing many in Red Bank to search for new ideas. 

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With a little imagination, a reinvigorated, energized socioeconomic future for Red Bank can be built on the abundant opportunity along the Dayton Boulevard corridor. 

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The 12-acre anticipated Red Bank Central Park property at 3715 Dayton Boulevard is the centerpiece of two opposing ideas for a brighter, rejuvenated Red Bank.  Our movement and this website arose to promote the idea that the addition of a large, 1st-class central park could be the anchor that lifts the Red Bank community and reinvigorates its social and economic life.

 

An epic, enticing public commons could be the social magnet that draws and creates a durable customer base in the downtown business district.  This new activity, in turn, could raise the viability of rebuilding a lively retail economy among the myriad left-behind commercial properties nearby. 

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The opposing idea is that the people’s Red Bank Central Park property, itself, should be sold to private developers.  The city’s budget would be padded with a short-lived cash windfall and a trickle of annual tax revenues.  The developer would rake in lucrative private gains.  The people would be left with token tiny pieces of green space. 

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A Win-Win solution is right in front of us.  Red Bank can have both a large, 1st-class unique park AND a revitalized central retail district -- by reinvesting in the 22 existing “depreciated” commercial properties within an easy walk of the Park. 

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If Red Bank really wants private investors to build a Cambridge Square-type town center development, any of the four old shopping centers along Dayton Boulevard would be appropriate sites.

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The data presented here highlights the extent of available, vacant, run-down, obsolete and underutilized commercial units and parcels along Dayton Boulevard, as well as the economic prominence of service businesses, as opposed to retail.  This data refutes assertions that any acreage of the people’s Red Bank Central Park needs to be sold and developed in order for the city to make room for more and better restaurant and retail space.