Jacksonville Auto History

[samiam]

Here is an interesting article


http://www.cowart.info/Florida%20History/Auto%20History/Auto%20History.htm

[Dog Walker]

Photo of the cars parked on the beach are from the early 1930's not the early 1900's.

Oh lord!, I remember that roller coaster and all of the games on the boardwalk!  (Old, old)

[Ocklawaha]

Well, if your old enough to remember hurricane Donna, your old enough to remember when our beach was the place where Florida tourists went for fun and sun.

A hurricane, a mouse and a whale later, nobody knows there IS a Jacksonville Beach. Sad indeed.


OCKLAWAHA
"The Ancient One"

[rjp2008]

Ock what has Jax done to accentuate the beaches? Not much.

Even from a simple practical perspective, there's only like 2 feet washing stations along the whole boardwalk and no water fountains!

[Dog Walker]

Heck, Ock,  I remember the hurricane of 1948.  Stood with my Dad on Seminole Beach and watched a big house slowly topple into the water.  Donna didn't hit here in 1960, but Dora did in 1964.  Made a mess.

[Ocklawaha]

The midway that went to sea...


The town that joined it...


"The Chateau"  or, uh, what WAS the Chateau...


Downtown? Yeah, anyone got a yellow submarine? Mass Transit you understand...

Well credit must be given for cleaning up a mess worse then Katrina, New Orleans was flooded with wind damage. On a much smaller scale, Jacksonville Beach was smacked with a sledgehammer and nearly wiped off the face of the earth.  Downtown on Bay Street water stood 5 feet deep. I remember watching most of our seaside buildings and midway as they were smashed and sent out to Davy Jones Locker.

For years Jacksonville Beach was America's Ruined Rivera, prices fell and nobody but the trailer park crowd, liqueur stores, sleazy bars and used car dealers would locate there.

The beaches (all of them except Mayport) have experienced a massive change for the better. The Seawalk, park and music pavilion are huge changes, the return of some of the little beach side shops are too.  The bars, clubs and specialty restaurants today are a far cry from the more recent past. Everything it seems has gone upscale, except for the little strip in front of the base... But let's even remember that THAT strip is there not because the Navy or Marine Corps is evil, but because a pack of civilian wolves are positioned to rob a bunch of naive youg men and women of their meager pay, and that IS something we could eliminate.

Much of what has been done since those dark 1960's storms is positive, while I do not agree with restrictions that hold us back, such as the silly 35 foot building limit, I think we are moving in the right direction. Those limits were never installed in south Florida, and by the 1970's the sun set over the beaches at about 1 pm, from then onward, the beaches were in the shadows. But I can see no reason why a case by case math calculation couldn't be worked out that would allow a 4 floor, 30 floor, 55 floor or 100 floor hotel from getting as close to the beach as possible without casting a huge shadow over it. 35' might make all the sense in the world on the Seawalk, but on the Intercoastal it's an insane waste of potential tax revenue.


OCKLAWAHA