Jones Beach State Park | |
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Aerial view of Jones Beach Island and Jones Beach State Park in July 2012
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Location of Jones Beach State Park within New York State
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Type | State park |
Location | 1 Ocean Parkway Wantagh, New York |
Coordinates | 40°35′45″N 73°30′55″W / 40.59583°N 73.51528°WCoordinates: 40°35′45″N 73°30′55″W / 40.59583°N 73.51528°W |
Area | 2,413 acres (9.77 km2) |
Created | August 4, 1929 |
Operated by | New York State Office of Parks, Recreation and Historic Preservation |
Visitors | 5,442,032 (in 2014) |
Open | All year |
Website | |
Jones Beach State Park, Causeway and Parkway System
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Wantagh Parkway approach to Jones Beach. Centered is the Jones Beach Water Tower.
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Location | Ocean, Wantagh, Meadowbrook and Loop state parkways, Wantagh, New York |
Coordinates | 40°36′51″N 73°32′10″W / 40.61417°N 73.53611°W |
Area | 10,034 acres (4,061 ha) |
NRHP Reference # | 05000358 |
Added to NRHP | April 28, 2005 |
Jones Beach State Park (colloquially, "Jones Beach") is a state park of the U.S. state of New York. It is in southern Nassau County, in the hamlet of Wantagh, on Jones Beach Island, a barrier island linked to Long Island by the Meadowbrook State Parkway, Wantagh State Parkway, and Ocean Parkway.
The park – 6.5 miles (10.5 km) in length – is renowned for its beaches (which, excepting the beach on Zachs Bay, face the open Atlantic Ocean) and furnishes one of the most popular summer recreational locations for the New York metropolitan area. It is the most popular and heavily visited beach on the East Coast, with an estimated six million visitors per year.
Northwell Health at Jones Beach Theater, an outdoor arena in the park, is a popular musical and concert venue. The park also includes a two-mile (3.2 km) long boardwalk. It once featured dining and catering facilities that were popular sites for private parties and weddings; these have been shut down.
Jones Beach is named after Major Thomas Jones, a major in the Queens County militia in the 1600s who established a whaling station on the outer beach near the site of the present park.
The park was created during Robert Moses' administration as President of the Long Island State Park Commission as part of the development of parkways on Long Island. Moses' first major public project, Jones Beach is free from housing developments and private clubs, and instead is open for the general public. Several homes on High Hill Beach were barged further down the island to West Gilgo Beach to make room for the park.