All Monmouth County Parks Reopen Saturday; Local Officials Cheer

HOLMDEL, NJ — Get ready: All Monmouth County parks will reopen to the public at sunrise this Saturday, in a dramatic change of course made by Gov. Phil Murphy today.

Monmouth County elected officials have been petitioning the governor to reopen state and county parks for weeks, since he first shut them down on April 7.

The Henry Hudson Trail will officially reopen as well. Middletown is also opening its tennis courts and sports fields back up, the first town in Monmouth County to do so. A decision has yet to be made by the National Park Service on whether or when they will be reopening Gateway National Park/Sandy Hook.

With the exception of the mental health importance of parks, Gov. Murphy said, the pressure — from protesters and others — on him to reopen them "did not matter one little bit."

"So with all due respect to all the pressure that's been out there, we couldn't frankly care," Murphy said Wednesday. "We make his call based on data, science and fact."

The coronavirus case curve has steadily dropping in New Jersey.

“I’m happy to see that the Governor appears to have listened to our continued requests for him to reopen the parks, despite our disagreement with his initial closure,” said Assemblywoman Serena DiMaso, Republican from Monmouth. “People have been in their homes for six weeks. The vast majority of them have done everything we’ve asked of them and we are seeing the positive outcome as a result. Lifting some of these heavy restrictions, even slowly and moderately, will help give residents much-needed hope that we can come out of this if they keep following important rules."

“While I firmly believe there was no scientific justification to close these facilities in the first place, I want to praise the administration for hearing the calls to reopen now,” said Senator Declan O’Scanlon, R, Monmouth. “While there will absolutely be some people who don’t adhere to safe practices, the overwhelming majority will."