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361-949-7700 editor@islandmoon.com The Island Newspaper since 1996 Facebook : The Island Moon Newspaper
May 30, 2013
It’s Memorial Day- Take a Veteran to Lunch
Around The Island
By Dale Rankin editor@islandmoon.com
Memorial Day has come and gone and it was a busy one. Getting into a Stripes store was harder than getting in to see a doctor at a Veterans’ Hospital. Based on the sheer number of people on our beaches it may have been the busiest holiday weekend we have ever seen. Beachgoers were lined up three deep behind the waterside seaweed and by Monday afternoon when they all headed home at the same time the trip from Port Aransas to SPID took more than an hour. As holiday weekends go, as far as traffic, this one was a booger.
Things we learned this Memorial Day. So what did we learn?
Next Publication Date: 6/6/2013
Funding Approved for Improvements at JFK Causeway
The old Really Crowded has become the New Normal. With the explosive growth in the San Antonio/Austin corridor and, in fact, across our state (see the numbers on this page) we are simply seeing more people come to The Island. Taking the ferries across to Port Aransas has become so time-consuming that the old Yogi Berra adage comes to mind, “no one goes that way; it’s too crowded” so the increased traffic load heads to and from Port A via the JFK. The intersection at SH 361 and SPID simply cannot handle the traffic anymore during regular busy intervals. Grocery shop on Thursday. Not that we didn’t already know this but now it is imperative. It is a special moment of panic that sets in when you have invited over neighbors to weather the Tourist Storm on your deck and you discover you are out of Bloody Mary Mix…oh the humanity! The narrowing of the beach near Newport Pass north of the Packery has sent the tourist throng south. Last year the beach at SoPac and the seawall were busy but not overrun. This year with the widening of the beach at the seawall due to dredge sand from the Packery being placed there combined with the narrowing of the northern beach stacked beachgoers up three deep from the north end of the seawall all the way to the end of Kleberg County on Sunday. This puts even more pressure on the SH 361/ SPID intersection.
“We are finishing with projects at five other sites,” Henry said, “We will be moving those crews here in the next few weeks.’ Henry said housing for the crews has already been secured on the The Island.
The work will see the addition of a paved parking lot and landscaping in the area located between the causeway and Packery Channel; in front of Billings Bait Stand and Clem’s Marina.
“The clubhouse (at Padre Isles Country Club) is going to be very different soon,” he said. A new building adjacent to the clubhouse will be the entryway to the waterpark, an open-air palapa for meetings and concerts will be just south of the existing clubhouse. Henry said the elevation of the park will be raised from between three to nine feet with the use of fill sand taken from
Awaiting outcome of Austin lawsuit
On the Rocks
Henry said at least nine holes of golf will remain open through this summer and one new green which had to be relocated is ready for seeding. “It took 180 days to get the final drawings done,” Henry said. “We have eight months to get open. We can do that.”
Coconut Woman
By Jay Gardner The plane finally hit the tarmac in Ft. Lauderdale, and we grabbed our bags, threw them in the rental, and headed south at a high rate of speed down the Florida Turnpike.
Editor’s note: Islanders Meredith Dunning and her fiancé Justin set off from The Island over a year ago is their 22-foot sailboat for points east. Since then they have traded for a bigger boat, sail up and down the East Coast, rode out a hurricane in Chesapeake Bay, and now are about to get married in Granada after racing their boat in a regatta that ends there later this year.
Mayor Nelda Martinez on Tuesday pulled an item from the council agenda which would have called for a council vote on a measure to put a fee or outright ban on the use of the bags after March of 2014. The ordinance, which was Bag Ban continued on A5
Texas Cities Lead in Population Growth in the US According to a release today by the U. S. Census Bureau, eight of the 15 fastest-growing large U.S. cities and towns for the year ending July 1, 2012 are in Texas. The Lone Star State also stood out in terms of the size of population growth, with five of the 10 cities and towns that added the most people over the year. Fastest Growing Large Texas Cities from July 1, 2011 to July 1, 2012 #1
San Marcos
#3
Midland
4.87%
#4
Cedar Park
4.67% 4.21%
Conroe
4.01%
The 4th of July comes on a Thursday this year so that means a Four-Day Island Party; better start saving up your energy now.
#11
McKinney
3.95%
#12
Frisco
3.92%
#13
Odessa
Mickey, Augs, Zep and I were headed down to Key West to meet up with Jeff and Thomas for a long weekend of fun in the sun and some fishing. Southern Florida (mainland) is pretty boring to me, with the sprawl of Miami headed On the Rocks continued on A 7
If you have ever thought about just sailing off into the sunset and wondered what it would be like, just as Meredith and Justin because that’s what they did. This latest tale of their epic journey comes from Marathon Key aboard their boat Coconut Woman. Coconut Woman continued on A 7
Angels, Serpents and Frescoes 22 Steps to the Little Chapel on the Dunes Part 4 © Brent Rourk – brentrourk@yahoo.com [This is part 4 of series of articles about The Little Chapel on the Dunes in Port Aransas, Texas. You can retrieve past copies of The Island Moon Newspaper on Facebook or by dropping by The Island Moon Newspaper office]
4.91%
Georgetown
In the meantime, say hello if you see us Around The Island.
Crews were on site Wednesday with earth moving equipment working in the area near the intersection of Commodores and Compass.
Islanders in the Keys
In spite of two cleanups in the area in the past few months plastic bags continue to roost on the dunes next to the Packery Channel Bridge.
#10
And finally, a get-well-soon to our friend Gladys Choyke who is laid up with a busted ankle this week. We haven’t heard the whole story yet – hope she didn’t break it jumping to a conclusion…can we borrow your Corvette until you get out?
canals on the site. He said that digging should start in the next few weeks.
The fate of a ban on single-use plastic bags in Corpus Christi is now in the hands of an Austin lawsuit.
#7
Our old-salt shrimper friends over Aransas Pass way tell us they can only remember one year when the cool weather persisted this late in the year…1970; the year of Hurricane Celia. Let’s hope it isn’t a pattern.
Year 16, Issue 476
By Dale Rankin
Scattershots
The Casino Night to raise money for the 4th of July Fireworks on The Island is this Saturday night at the County Club. See the ad in this issue for details.
By Dale Rankin
Thirteen years after the project was first proposed, the Corpus Christi City Council on Tuesday approved $1.4 million for improvements to the area adjacent to the east side of the JFK Causeway.
Vote on Plastic Bag Ban is Banned at City Council
Final Plans for Schlitterbahn Beach Country Resort
By Dale Rankin
Thirteen years in the making
JFK continued on A4
A stop-gap solution would be to add a second right turn lane to SH 361 at the SPID intersection; this is where the bottleneck happens that starts the accordion effect that back cars up all the way to Port Aransas. The 99% of the cars want to turn right on SPID must go down to one lane because turning right from the center (forward to Commodores) lane is blocked by the white sticks in the roadway.
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The final drawings for the Schlitterbahn Beach Country Resort are done and work is set to begin in earnest in the next two weeks, according to Jeff Henry, whose family owns the Schlitterbahn franchise and who is supervising the construction.
Phase I of the project was completed in 2011 and included new boat ramps and a bulkhead. Phase II, set to begin in July and be completed in October, will provide pavement at each end of the parking lot with gravel in the center. The remainder of the paving is planned for a future and undetermined date.
State Highway 361 with its one lane each way isn’t enough any more. Even on regular weekends on Sunday afternoon the road is a mess. The problem is twofold; first, while weekend traffic seeps onto The Island like an incoming hurricane tide, it tries to rip out all at once like an outgoing hurricane deluge that takes houses with it.
Additions and Changes
3.83%
The Texas cities that added the most people (From July 1, 2011 to July 1, 2012) included: Houston
increased
34,625
San Antonio
increased
25,400
Austin
increased
25,395
Dallas
increased
23,341
Fort Worth
increased
16,328
Out of the 15 most populous cities in the U.S. Texas cities rank as follows: #4
Houston
population
2,160,821
#7
San Antonio population
1,382,951
#9
Dallas
population
1,241,162
#11
Austin
population
842,592
Over the years there have been improvements, additions and changes to the Chapel in addition to the frescoes first adorning the walls in 1978. The original door was removed and stored, and then replaced with a more modern door. A few years ago the original door was located, restored and hung. Two stylistically modern stained glass windows grace the north and south walls of the Chapel, adding color and permitting more diffused and colorful into the Chapel. These two larger stained glass windows show dunes and dune grasses with a brilliant sun, a sunset and the blue sky. They clearly reflect what the dunes and surrounding area looked like 75 years ago when the Chapel was built.
Crosses and an Inscription Two crosses originally topped the Chapel roof (gabled at one end with a custom hip at the other end where the Chapel points east).
The Chapel altar with one of the old roof crosses and new window framing History continued on A11