Building a beach icon 

Blight and competition. The two words seem to echo throughout downtown Myrtle Beach these days, ringing off the bare walls and boarded windows of buildings whose tenants closed their doors when they heard The Pavilion was leaving or braved it out to see if they could make things work without the amusement park.

Yes, the beach is still the No. 1 attraction and the city's most precious asset. But as more destination spots open and grow - Hard Rock Park, The Market Common, Broadway at the Beach - there are more reasons for tourists to spend time and money away from the shore.

The Downtown Redevelopment Corp. thinks it has the solution, or at least a vital part of it, in its proposed boardwalk from First Avenue North to 14th Avenue North, but as Myrtle Beach gets ready to consider next year's budget, there are some questions about the proposed $12 million amenity:

Can a new boardwalk become the icon many hope it will be?

Will the boardwalk have a corporate sponsor?

The city had a wooden boardwalk in the 1930s and '40s. It morphed into a concrete walkway, but Hurricane Hazel destroyed most of it in 1954. There are about two blocks of walkway now between Mr. Joe White Avenue and Ninth Avenue North.

"People come looking for the boardwalk," said Buz Plyler, owner of the Gay Dolphin. "They ask where to find it. I've heard that all my life."

That's what the Downtown Redevelopment Corp. has heard, too, in visitor surveys: People expect a boardwalk in a beach town.

Many beach cities have walkways: Atlantic City, N.J.; Santa Cruz, Calif.; Venice Beach, Calif. Closer to home there are Conway's Riverwalk, Murrells Inlet's Marsh Walk and Georgetown's Harbor Walk.

The one that compares closest with the one proposed for Myrtle Beach is in Ocean City, Md., said David Sebok, Downtown Redevelopment Corp. director.

At more than 2 miles long, Ocean City's path is longer than Myrtle Beach's proposed 1-mile trail, but the style is similar: a well-lighted place for anyone to bike, walk or jog, shop, eat at one of the restaurants or visit entertainment venues.

Ocean City has inns and hotels along its walk, but at its end has an amusement park.

Myrtle Beach's walk would not be built around an amusement park, like Santa Cruz, or around casinos, like Atlantic City, but would be close to Ocean Boulevard attractions.

With 7,500 permanent residents, Ocean City is a town built around the century-old boardwalk that's lined with shops, hotels and restaurants.

"It's a wonderful mix," said Ocean City boardwalk innkeeper Vicki Barrett said. "There's something for everyone."

She said 97 percent of the more than 350,000 peak-season visitors in her three-season resort town hit the boardwalk at some point during their stays.

"The city is extremely supportive of it because the boardwalk is the city's iconic feature," she said.

Boardwalk cities

Sebok said he knows other boardwalk cities have had their walkways for years but that there are cities all over the country building walkways and taking advantage of their natural resources.

Seattle's waterfront has become a tourist attraction, he said, and there is even a hotel in Florida called The Boardwalk, along with which the developer built a boardwalk.

"I don't think anyone thinks it's the city's ace in the hole," said Myrtle Beach oceanfront merchant Chris Walker, a supporter of the Downtown Redevelopment Corp.'s plans. "But we're all here, one way or the other, for the ocean. I think a boardwalk would just make people want to stay downtown more."

That's a concern because owners of existing businesses are learning they have to be more clever to compete with the attractions away from the ocean, Walker said, and because downtown is suffering a bit since The Pavilion was razed.

"I think we've got two black eyes: parts of downtown and Kings Highway," Walker said. "If I were a visitor, I'd think this area was a little depressed."

But it's not: The city's $130 million budget allows for a variety of civic projects, debt repayment and even donations.

However, 83 percent of the general fund comes from the business community, said City Councilman Chuck Martino, so it's vitally important that businesses thrive in the city.

"We have amazingly low property tax rates here," Martino said. "That's dependent on the success of our business community. Sales tax supports our schools. Every dollar generated in the business community is a dollar our residents don't have to pay for services."

Adding personality

Martino and fellow council members Susan Grissom Means, Randal Wallace, Mike Chestnut, Phil Render and Mayor John Rhodes support the boardwalk, they said. None thinks it will be the sole iconic feature of the city, but rather one of the city's prime features.

"I view it as a revitalization tool," Render said.

Many hope downtown businesses will use the boardwalk as a reason to revamp, and the ones adjoining could open back walls or add doors so boardwalk users could go right in.

Means said she doesn't think people will come here just for the boardwalk; but once they get here, it will be a big draw for return visits and will market itself like other boardwalks often do.

Spokesmen for the Santa Cruz Beach Boardwalk, for example, said families return there generation after generation, making new memories while reliving old memories.

Plyler said he thinks the boardwalk will define Myrtle Beach's personality.

Councilman Wayne Gray said he's in favor of the boardwalk but doesn't think it carries more importance than other infrastructure improvements that have been and are being made in the downtown area.

"It's also hard to consider it a primary public amenity when there's no idea about what's going to be developed on the centerpiece of downtown - the 11 acres that is the former Pavilion site," Gray said.

The council and mayor have pressed developer Burroughs & Chapin to at least bring forward some ideas about the site for discussion, but so far, the development company has refused, except to say it wants a retail component on the site.

B&C said it will pay for its share of the boardwalk construction and participate in any special tax the city imposes on the business owners.

"B&C's redevelopment of the Pavilion site will not guarantee the boardwalk's success because that site is only one part of a much larger downtown area," spokesman Pat Dowling wrote in an e-mail. He said the boardwalk, improved traffic flow and more public parking downtown will all factor in to the success of the former Pavilion site and the rest of downtown.

Another viewpoint

Not everyone likes the idea of the boardwalk, though.

Mayur Jeram, who owns the Bayview Resort and seven other downtown properties, said he and other property owners who don't speak out publicly think the money would be better spent cleaning up the downtown area. They are also concerned about safety.

"We already have people sleeping under the beach accesses," he said, "and 'the oldest business' is still going on down here."

He said seasonal resorts were broken into this winter so people could sleep indoors, streetscaping is not finished along Ocean Boulevard and plans to bury utility lines in his area have been pushed down the priority list.

The boardwalk design means he'll lose a prime area his resort guests now use to sunbathe and have an unobstructed view of the ocean - an encroachment into city land that cannot be developed upon.

"Right now, I don't see it," Jeram said. "My homeowners' association doesn't either."

Jeram said it might be a different story if the city were made of money, but the boardwalk's funding won't all fall to the city.

At the end of March, the City Council will gather in Pinopolis for its annual three-day budget retreat. City staff and the Downtown Redevelopment Corp. will present a boardwalk funding plan that combines public money from Municipal Improvement, Tax Increment Financing and Business License Improvement districts, grants, private funding and perhaps even corporate sponsorship to complete the project.

Rhodes brought up the idea at a January workshop, and it was received well by some and met with skepticism by others.

"We have a lot of corporate stores here, and they are here because of Myrtle Beach's success in the tourist industry. They are here because of what we built," Rhodes said. "I'm asking for them to be true citizens of the community."

He cited the timeshare industry as one group that makes "a lot of money but hasn't had to put money back into the city like other businesses."

Sponsorship issues

While Councilman Wallace said at the January workshop he'd be "proud to walk on the Budweiser Boardwalk," others balk at the idea of a sponsor that's not "family friendly."

"I'm not 100 percent sold on it," Councilman Chestnut said. "I don't have a problem talking about it, but we'd really need to look at the whole package - what would the sponsor want in exchange?"

Councilwoman Means said if there is sponsorship, she wants it to represent Myrtle Beach.

Walker, who owns the haunted house, Old Time Photos and Mad Myrtle's Ice Cream, said he's not sure about a single sponsor for the entire boardwalk.

"I don't know that I'd call it tacky, because we've made a success out of being tacky," he said, suggesting smaller sections of the walk could be sponsored by several companies.

Rhodes said anything is possible at this point.

"In the situation we're in now - having to raise $12 million to $14 million - we'd have to entertain any and all possibilities," Rhodes said. "It's the same people who get hit up for money time after time here, and they need relief."