MANTOLOKING, N.J. — Some beach towns have plenty of ways to keep outsiders off their sand: Limit on-street parking, prohibit food and drink, and have no public bathrooms.
One town literally walls off the public from much of the ocean with a stone seawall and offers virtually no parking for miles along it.
Beach access has become a long, drawn-out court battle in many coastal states. And now in New Jersey, the state Department of Environmental Protection is bowing to complaints from some local governments and private property owners that state access rules are too strict.
The department is letting each shore town decide for itself what level of public access is appropriate, though the state agency gets a chance to sign off on each plan. That has some fearing towns will become even more restrictive.
“This is extremely frustrating,” said Ralph Coscia, who co-founded Citizens Right to Access Beaches after the Point Pleasant Beach was bulldozed for luxury homes about a decade ago. “This sets us back 15 years. Everything we’ve tried to do all these years is falling apart.”
