Exclusive Letters To You podcast: Asbury Park's New Buildings, New Plans…Same Old Played Out Scenes?
- Letters To You
- 12 minutes ago
- 3 min read
July 16, 2026
"Come on, rise up!" exhorts Bruce Springsteen in "My City of Ruins," originally written for his adopted and beloved hometown of Asbury Park, NJ. The seaside resort town has been strongly tied to Springsteen's music, persona, and recording career since even before an Asbury Park postcard served as the visual centerpiece of his first album-cover. When Springsteen played his famous 2024 show on the Asbury Park beach (documented for posterity here and here,) "My City of Ruins" wasn't part of the Asbury-centric setlist, but as recent events have shown, it sure could have (and maybe should have?) been, since Asbury Park - like so many other U.S. communities - still has much more rising to do indeed.
Once again, many of the town's residents and other lovers of "Little Eden" are greatly concerned about the future of two of its boardwalk's historic structures: the Casino and Convention Hall. And even more important, after a quarter-century of redevelopment deals, plans, promises, accomplishments, and failures, poor and working-class people in Asbury Park, NJ, especially those who live in the city's long-racially-segregated West Side section, still have little to nothing to show for it. Plenty of expensive real-estate now exists on the waterfront, for sure, but there's still a serious lack of affordable housing for most residents, racism and segregation remain deeply embedded, and essential public services like schools have received no significant funding increases from the celebrated high-end real-estate boom.
Earlier this week, Letters To You recorded a special one-hour podcast conversation to dive deeply into what's been happening recently in Asbury Park, how strongly it's tied to the city's past, and - most important - what it could mean for Asbury Park's future as a city that finally and truly could "rise up" into something better for all of its citizens. Our panel consisted of:
The Asbury Park Press reporters Mike Davis and Charles Daye, who've co-written this year's excellent and ongoing series of "Tale of Two Asburys" reports
LettersToYou.net contributing writer, longtime music journalist, activist, and Jersey Shore resident Lisa Iannucci
Writer, poet, and historian Daniel Wolff, author of Fourth of July, Asbury Park: A History of the Promised Land, which explored in groundbreaking detail the city’s first 150 years and how its struggles reflect and inform our struggles as a nation here in the U.S.
The conversation was moderated by LettersToYou.net's editor/publisher Shawn Poole. We covered a lot of ground and explored many issues that are relevant and important not just for the citizens of Asbury Park, but for all citizens of the U.S. - as well as of anywhere else - who need to grapple with racism, economic inequity, and how communities can lead efforts to build better economic and social systems for everyone's benefit.
You can click below to listen to the conversation right here, and/or on our SoundCloud/YouTube platforms:
And to read more about these issues...
Click here to read "Convention Hall is falling apart. Here's why fixes have taken forever"Â by Mike Davis and Charles Daye (The Asbury Park Press, June 8, 2026.)
Click here to read "A tale of two Asbury Parks, from Dark City to 'haven for the wealthy'" by Charles Daye and Mike Davis (The Asbury Park Press, June 8, 2026.)
Click here to read "Asbury Park Casino can't easily be taken from developer, city says" by Charles Daye (The Asbury Park Press, June 11, 2026.)
Click here to read "5 takeaways from packed City Council meeting about Asbury boardwalk" by Charles Daye (The Asbury Park Press, July 10, 2026.)