Christmas Light Show A No-Go In Wall For 2018

WALL, NJ — The organizers of a Christmas light show in Wall Township that was canceled in 2017 have announced the show is not returning for 2018.

But while the organizers say they have worked for months to get the township's permission to hold the show at the Woolley Road home that has hosted the show since its inception in 2006, township officials say they have been clear for three years on one point: the show has outgrown the location.

The Christmas Light Show, which had raised money for a special needs sports organization for more than 10 years, announced the cancellation on Facebook.

"RAISING4 INC. has worked tirelessly to relaunch a local and free Christmas tradition that has brought joy to thousands of families and financially supported a worthy local charity," organizers said on the event's website, citing what it says was months of negotiation and effort to address safety concerns and impact on the neighborhood.

"The show has outgrown the residential neighborhood," Wall Township Administrator Jeff Bertrand said Monday morning. "They were advised of that three years ago."

"In 2015, they were told it was the last one," Bertrand said.

Dan Brateris, one of the event organizers, had previously estimated the show at the Woolley Road home of the Epp family had drawn more than 12,000 visitors in 2014 to its three-night event that combined thousands of lights, pyrotechnic effects, concert lighting, and robotic effects synchronized to Christmas music.

On Monday afternoon, Brateris said their previous attendance estimates were incorrect.

"We did some serious attendance analysis in developing our traffic and logistics plans for the proposed show this year and it looks like our largest single night attendance ever was about 1,800," Brateris said in a follow-up email. "Our largest yearly attendance over three nights was about 5,500."

Brateris, who is director of experiential learning at New Jersey Institute of Technology, said the holiday display serves as a case study to help teach his students about real-world applications of their studies. The event also raised money for Rally Cap Sports, which serves children with special needs, through voluntary donations by visitors. More than $10,000 in donations for the organization were received in 2016, he said.

"We have previously secured unanimous written consent from the neighbors and there is no evidence that event needs to be, or is, a burden on public resources," Brateris wrote in a news release about the show being prevented from restarting.

But the volume of visitors to the lights show was simply overwhelming the neighborhood, Bertrand said. Woolley Road is bounded by New Bedford Road on one end, and turns north near Route 18 and becomes Lincoln Avenue, which ends at Belmar Boulevard. The road has been completely blocked off to motor vehicles in recent years as the number of visitors has grown.

Though the event organizers said they had "unanimous support" of the neighbors, Bertrand said the town had received feedback from some neighbors that indicated the support wasn't unanimous.

Bertrand acknowledged that the group had made efforts to adjust, and said there had been ongoing discussions with the group's attorney. Brateris wrote the changes included moving from two nightly shows to rolling 30-minute programming so visitors could come and go at their leisure to spread out the traffic impact, and arranging for parking and shuttle buses from Wall Township High School to limit pedestrian traffic. In previous years, parking had been at the North Wall Little League, which resulted in people crossing the busy but poorly lit Belmar Boulevard in the dark.

Brateris said Monday that the group has asked the township "multiple times ... to provide evidence that the show is unmanageable in the location that we have historically had the show."

"We have had the show for 11 years without incident, so we do not inherently feel that the show has outgrown the location. We also have had professional engineering review the new plans that we sent the township and they have not provided any substantive response," he said.

And while Brateris accused the township of wanting to take over the show, Bertrand said that simply was not true.

"The township has no desire to run a light show," Bertrand said.

"The bottom line is we have made offers for the last four years for them to relocate it and we've heard all the reasons why they can't do that," he said.

Brateris said the alternate locations suggested by the township have not been workable for hosting the light show: the North Wall Little League field, Camp Evans, and the Farmhouse on township grounds. The Farmhouse later turned out to be structurally unsound, Brateris said.

"They suggested we decorate the baseball backstops" at the Little League complex, and while Camp Evans was considered a possibility, Brateris said they "could not find an appropriate structure with the proper architectural elements and adequate room for viewing" at that site.

"Additionally, the financial burden created by moving and the physical size of the available structures was too large for us to consider. We also needed access to the space prior to Base of Terror ending, which was not feasible," he said. "It has always been our position, that if provided with the appropriate fiscal resources, logistical resources, and location, we were willing to move the show to satisfy the township. We understand that locations that may require less logistical resources exist, however we have not been able to find an appropriate location that is fiscally, artistically, and logistically feasible."

Bertrand said holding it in the neighborhood is simply unworkable.

"Two different police chiefs (have done) the analysis and the report is the same: it is not safe to have all those people parking in that neighborhood," Bertrand said.

"We're not trying to kill the holiday spirit. It has just outgrown the neighborhood," he said. "We can't ignore the safety experts."

Brateris said the group continues to encourage donations to RallyCap Sports (click here for information) and said they hope to find a workable solution in 2019.

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Note: This article has been updated with comment from organizer Dan Brateris stating his previous estimates of three-day attendance of 12,000 people — information taken from previous public statements by Brateris —were inaccurate.

Photo via YouTube