Indian Wells Success Story
A number of changes at Amagansett’s Indian Wells Beach have corrected what had seemed a permanently bad situation, and East Hampton Town officials deserve a great deal of credit.
Think back to the summer before last, and the several before that, when Indian Wells regulars faced a hundreds-strong weekend social scene there. Beer seemed a key ingredient in a daytime party that drew young adults to swim, talk, and play games that included throwing full cans of Bud Light at one another in the surf. Taxis and buses swarmed the narrow Indian Wells parking lot as they jockeyed to shuttle the party crowd to and from the beach. On a summer weekend afternoon, heaps of garbage overflowed the metal bins.
Residents and visitors who had always thought of Indian Wells as a quiet place to go with children, read a book, and take in some sun pressed the town, which manages the beach there, for action. Doing something about the parking lot was a must, as, it appeared, was some limit on alcohol consumption.
Well, that last part, banning alcohol, caused some strife. The town trustees, who own many of the town’s beaches on behalf of the public, seemed at the time more narrowly concerned with protecting the rights of the few to drink booze than to assure a reasonably sane situation for all beachgoers. The negotiations between the town board and trustees on the beer question were the stuff of legend, but in the end, they agreed on a test prohibition in 2014.
A town board move to put a gatehouse and vehicle turnaround near Bluff Road, far landward of the parking lot, with attendants checking for resident parking permits met with less opposition. A new rule that bonfires be only in metal containers and more frequent trash collection reduced problems.
By itself, the Indian Wells success story is significant. A drunken scene that made parents unhappy about bringing their children there on Saturdays and Sundays is gone, it is generally easy to find a parking space (provided one has the correct sticker), trash no longer mars the view, and the sand — ah, the sand! — has returned to its glorious, pillowy white, unstained by thousands of flecks of charcoal, as it had been in previous years.
Indian Wells also proves that something can be done to make sure favorite places return to the way most residents want them. As the downtown Montauk beach, in particular, has now become the new party spot, those irked by the chaos might ask the town board: Why not change the rules there as well? Meanwhile, it should be thanked for effective action in Amagansett.