Seaside Heights to Significantly Expand Boardwalk Speaker System for 2024

Speakers along the boardwalk in Seaside Heights, N.J., Sept. 2023. (Photo: Shorebeat)

A second phase of a project to replace the public address system along the Seaside Heights boardwalk is moving forward, with a contract having been awarded Wednesday to significantly expand the system so it can be better heard on the beach itself.

Seaside Heights once utilized a wireless PA system along the boardwalk, but began replacing it around 2020, after years of issues dating back to a previous borough administration. The replacement system is hard-wired, with speakers mounted on poles and its sound strategically directed to a particular area.

The new system will consist of 16 additional speakers across eight locations on the boardwalk. All but two of the speakers will be mounted on 18-foot poles, and will direct sound toward the boardwalk as well as out to the beachfront itself, so guests on the sand can hear emergency messages. Two speakers will be mounted on buildings.

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The speakers will be mounted at:

• Lincoln Avenue (Pole)
• Franklin Avenue Stage (Pole)
• South Lifeguard Station (Roof)
• Sumner Avenue (Pole)
• Hancock Avenue (Pole)
• North Lifeguard Station (Roof)
• Carteret Avenue (Pole)
• Hiering Avenue (Pole)

The JBL outdoor speakers will come with bases and electrical conduits that allow the system to be powered and networked together. The cost of the system will be $135,407.

Borough Administrator Christopher Vaz said the borough will be putting the speaker expenditure together with a package of items in a formal request to the state’s recently-announced $100 million boardwalk maintenance fund, the product of a bi-partisan bill signed into law by Gov. Phil Murphy last month. Applications for grant funding are due Oct. 31. The contract was awarded to Open Systems Integrators, the same contractor that installed the first phase of the wired speaker transition, Vaz said.