The Waterpark Wildwood NEVER Got

The Waterpark Wildwood NEVER Got

If you have been following the news lately you would have seen that a new waterpark is coming to Atlantic City.

The $100 million indoor water park will sit on the Atlantic City Boardwalk and will be called Island Waterpark.

It will feature water slides, pools, a lazy river, food and beverage outlets, retail space, lounge areas, and more.

The water park will be a mix of an outdoor water park and an indoor one. This would allow folks to enjoy it year-round.

But did you know that North Wildwood was supposed to have one of its own?

It was 2006 and the economy in America was booming. Here in the Wildwoods, we were having our own kind of boom. Old mid-century Motels were being torn down monthly to become condos.

It was during this time that the city of North Wildwood was trying to find what to do with their aging Seaport Village.

Seaport Pier was located here at 22nd and the boardwalk. The village or pier consisted of shops, food stalls, the best candy store on the boardwalk and a stage in the back.

At this time the pier was really starting to show its age. Certain sections were boarded up and some people started breaking into the abandoned stores and causing havoc.

North Wildwood City Council voted 5-1 to designate that Block 291, the site between 22nd and 23rd avenues, be considered an area of redevelopment.

They later put up a bid request for developers for the pier and one of them caught their eye.

WB Resorts Development LLC was a limited liability company founded in 2006 by Andrew Weiner and Brian and Daniel Baratz.

Weiner’s name may sound familiar to you since his family has been on the boardwalk for four generations. Weiner’s past portions included Managing Partner of the Splash Zone Waterpark.

WB Resorts proposed an idea that hadn’t been done before on the Jersey Shore, an indoor waterpark with an attached hotel.

The plans called for a 16-story, 425-room hotel a 6-story parking garage that could hold up to 600 cars, a spa-and-fitness facility, three restaurants, and a 90,000-square-foot indoor pirate-themed waterpark called “Captain Andy’s Indoor Waterpark Resort.” The resort was to be known as Seaport Pier and would create 400 year-round, permanent jobs.

This major project was expected to cost roughly $175 million to build.

In 2007 the North Wildwood Council approved the plans and gave permits to start construction in 2008. It was estimated that it would take 16 months to build giving us a summer 2010 opening date. All that was left to do was to wait for the NJ DEP approvals.

In our video below we will showcase the illustrations form of what could have been.

We also break down why it never happened.

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