WILDWOOD, NJ - It’s a race against time for the construction crews installing the specially designed sidewalks and intersections of the Revitalized Rio Grande Avenue entry corridor into Wildwood.

The crews are working to have all the sidewalk paving completed before Memorial Day. As a temporary measure, four intersections on Rio Grande Avenue (with New Jersey, Pacific, Atlantic and Ocean Avenues) will be covered with asphalt for the summer.

The estimated $2 million Rio Grande Revitalization project is being undertaken by the City of Wildwood to bring the best elements of Wildwood—the beach, boardwalk and the eclectic Doo-Wop style architectural buildings—to the ‘front door’ of the city and to provide a ‘boulevard’ feel to the entry corridor.

"Wildwood has the largest selection of mid-20th century buildings in the U.S.," says Mike Porch, executive director of Main Street Wildwood. "We wanted to make the design elements of these unique structures an attraction for Wildwood."

SOSH Architects and Remington Vernick and Walberg Engineers achieved this concept through the creative use of interlocking concrete paving stones throughout 115,000 square feet of sidewalk and street intersection areas.

The EP Henry Corporation, headquartered in Woodbury NJ, is providing the pavers for the project.

"The street intersection designs require 10 different colored pavers, of which 7 were custom made specifically for the Rio Grande Avenue project,"says Michael Anderson, the South Jersey Sales Manager for EP Henry.

"The sidewalk design integrates three colors of EP Henry pavers into a ‘wavy’ design that spans 3 city blocks," explains Frank Lomangino, owner of Tough Turf, the Hardscaping installer for the project. "We will have this part of the project completed before Memorial Day".

The final phase of the project will conclude when the specially designed streetscapes are installed to replace the asphalt in each intersection after Labor Day.

The intersection designs presented an especially challenging opportunity to the design team.SOSH and Remington, Vernick&Walberg collaborated with City Officials in the design of the multicolored EP Henry paved street areas to include unique icons of the Wildwood vernacular in each intersection. The sun, the sand and sea, entertainment and boardwalk fun are all represented in the elaborately designed intersections.

This is the graphic design of the intersection between Pacific Avenue and Rio Grande Avenue and represents entertainment. The other intersection designs include the Sun (New Jersey Avenue), Waves & Water (Atlantic Avenue) and a Ferris Wheel (Ocean Avenue).

"We also added oversized footprints in the crosswalk areas to emphasize the fun atmosphere of the seashore environment of the Wildwoods," explains Bill McLees, SOSH architect and member of the design team.

The intersection theme designs are being manufactured by Paverart, a southern New Jersey company which has patented a new process to integrate artwork within concrete pavers. In a paperless process, the original CAD-drawn documents generated by SOSH were forwarded to Paverart for use with their new computer-driven cutting process. The collaborative effort saved the City of Wildwood in both the cost and time.

Seroka will cut the colored EP Henry pavers into the right shapes and sizes required by the design ready for Lomangino’s crews to install in September.

The Rio Grande Avenue Revitalization Project follows major underground utility restoration. The use of EP Henry pavers makes it especially easy to reach these utilities for future maintenance.

The Project is funded by grants received from the USEDA ($1 million) NJDCA ($363,000) and USDA ($954,000).Project completion is expected to be October of 2003.