The health of the historic resort community is not in doubt. But a streetscape master plan project begun in January wants to identify parts of the downtown that can be improved. And planners want more public opinion.
Beetlebung owners Renee and John Molinari, the newest holders of a seasonal all-alcohol license in Oak Bluffs, plan to cater to a different audience than the typical bar. The Menemsha-based business will fill one of several vacancies on Circuit avenue with a hybrid coffeehouse and bar, to open in May.
An Oak Bluffs business owner’s months-long battle with the town to generate income on his property may be nearing resolution.
At meetings spanning the spring and summer, Bill Coggins asked selectmen to support various plans for a Circuit avenue lot he purchased in April. The board discouraged him from pursuing options that included food trucks and retail cars, saying they would compete with brick and mortar businesses and violate a town bylaw that prohibits the exhibition of wares on the street.
It’s not unusual to see a group of people traveling the streets of Oak Bluffs together, to see them stop in the middle of a Circuit avenue sidewalk and gaze up at a historic building, or stand next to the Tabernacle and take in the quiet calm of the Camp Ground.
But the group touring the resort community Monday morning were not tourists.
A months-long dispute between the Oak Bluffs selectmen and a Circuit avenue businessman came to a head this week when the owner of an unbuilt lot at 16 Circuit avenue saw fresh opposition to his latest proposal for a business venture.
On a dog day this summer, I paid a visit to Oak Bluffs. With midsummer traffic, it’s a bit of a jaunt from West Tisbury where I now live, but Oak Bluffs is on the water and West Tisbury center isn’t, and getting a glimpse of boats and a harbor seemed a cooling and inviting prospect. My Saturday afternoon stroll along the harbor and Circuit avenue brought back many memories.
Ask for a naked Fat Ronnie and it can only get better from there.
That’s the basic half-pound burger at Fat Ronnie’s, the new burger joint on Circuit avenue in Oak Bluffs, which comes with the simple fixings of a beef patty and bun. There are also 22 toppings (30 by the end of the summer) that you can choose from, or the fish burger made with haddock, the turkey or veggie burger or the burrito burger, to name a few.
Ray (Scott) Santinello was five years old when he got his first haircut. It took place on the third floor of his family’s home in Springfield, and the barber was a young friend of the family. It was the 1950s and the barber, Benito Mancinone, had recently immigrated to the city from Molise, a small town located on a mountain in Italy.
Mr. Santinello is 61 now and Benny the Barber, long a mainstay of Circuit avenue in Oak Bluffs, is still cutting his hair.
“He’s my barber. I just don’t change,” Mr. Santinello said on a recent Tuesday morning.
In light of several renovation projects around the downtown area, the Oak Bluffs selectmen Monday reconsidered a longstanding town policy to prohibit downtown construction work from June 1 to Sept. 15.
At a special meeting, the selectmen adopted clarifying regulations to allow construction work inside buildings during the summer with several conditions, including no work on weekends and nights.
Oak Bluffs entered the summer season Tuesday with heated debate over issues from one end of Circuit avenue to the other. At the upper end of the avenue, unfinished construction on the Edgartown National Bank’s new building was a central point of contention. Later, selectmen grappled with whether to allow a stationary food truck on the lower end of the avenue.
