Visitors Center Near Completion on Ocean City Causeway

Ocean City visitors traveling to the Doo Dah Parade on April 13 will not be able to stop at the new Welcome Center on the reconstructed Route 52 causeway, but visitors to the Spring Block Party on May 4 probably will.

The building is complete, the access roads ready and parking lines painted. The Ocean City Regional Chamber of Commerce is waiting only for final word that the project is complete.

The state Department of Transportation was unable on Monday to confirm an exact date for turning keys over, but Executive Director Michele Gillian said the Chamber hopes to equip the new visitors center and complete the move by May 1.

The visitors center is the final major component of a six-year, $400 million project to overhaul the main causeway leading to Ocean City.

The Chamber will staff the new visitors center and provide information, beach tag sales and other visitor services. Gillian said the existing Welcome Center at Ninth Street and Simpson Avenue will remain open and provide the same services through the summer.

The causeway opened to car traffic in May 2012 with two new towering fixed-span bridges and an elevated roadway connecting them. In addition to the visitors center, the project includes fishing piers, boat ramps and a separated pedestrian/bicycle path. 

The visitors center will include parking, access to a fishing pier, rest rooms and sweeping views of the marshes and Great Egg Harbor Bay from a second-story deck. See a gallery of images above.