The slightly anarchic stretch of beach where they don’t post lifeguards or mind if you go topless was just too damaged by Hurricane Sandy to reopen this year, and it’s such a low priority for the Gateway National Recreation Area that it may not open in 2014, Gothamist has learned. That is bad for our summer plans, but the silver lining is that it might just reset the charm of a beach that, in 2005, New York wrote “feels like the city’s best-kept secret.” It certainly didn’t feel that way last summer, when throngs from Williamsburg flocked there by the jitney-load. It sucks to lose the beach for a season or two, but if a little time away helps get it back to the semi-wild strip we once knew, that would be okay. In the meantime, the rest of Rockaway, where the businesses are, would probably appreciate the customers.
