How about
 

Ok, so it has to be fun.....why make it fun for just kids, how about all ages. How about a SkyZone? (Check out their website). This company is growing in popularity. Fun for all ages and could survive year round with private parties,corporate events, dodge ball leagues., etc.

I hope that "the powers that be" will read these posts and see what the residents of the region want, Fun and nostalgia.... and what we don't want More Vacant lots!!!!!

So what went into the Wide Open Saloon space? It wasn't torn down, it burned, but really the same difference. Easier in some respects.

That's right, nothing (unless something just did) - because noone wants to invest there.....who would want to be the first ? Why do you suppose that is?

Unfortunately, the "powers to be" cannot develop / build anything. What is needed is a developer with a vision and deep pockets. The Weirs is too seasonal to really sustain any type of year round development.

How about a nice new Marriot Hotel with indoor pool and fabulous restaurant? No condos, just apartments to rent by the day or week. And while they are at it tear down the drive in theater and make it the parking for the hotel.

I don't recall the source but a few years ago someone told me that putting a upscale Church Landing style hotel at the Weirs on the site where Logs-O-Fun, the post office (and not much more) now is was being considered. Part of the plan was to build a nice footbridge over the channel to the beach and invest in beach improvements.

Apparently the plan was shelved but I thought that would be a great first step in transforming Weirs Beach.

Did anyone else hear about this?

Need a plan!
 

I don't think investors will spend much money before a comprehensive master plan is established.

There's lots of ways this can happen but the likely ways are very slow.

The city can get involved, using taxes or permits to indirectly drive development.

The city can sit back and let private entities buy up the land for cheap as it gets more and more run down. Bike week does set a bottom limit on the value.

The city can take certain parcels by eminent domain and develop them or sell to a developer.

I'm not sure how a master plan comes in to play, who pays for this plan and who enforces it?

It only takes a few successful businesses to flip the trend. Think about a string of old time lakefront camps. One guy sells out and someone builds a mansion. Now all the nearby places, become much more valuable and their taxes shoot up. Suddenly the old timers places can't afford the taxes and must sell.

City of Laconia
 

Right now they are concentrating on revitalizing downtown, the character was destroyed by Urban Renewal. (City flatly denied to this day UR was not the problem). Weirs is the least of their problem as there is enough money generated by Bike Week.

I agree a master plan must be established. The beach erosion must be taken care of. etc. etc.

Until the city wakes up, I think Weirs will become a ghost town.

Ok so if Bike Week is the bread and butter for them, they need to get on the ball before it migrates away. The two other events that I know of just off the top of my head are 1. Lake G. NY has a big event, 2. Hershey PA has an event. Both right in the backyard.

One thought I keep having for an idea at the Wiers is a long pier that would extend way out into the water. Similar to Clearwater, FL., I believe, but am not positive that is the right beach area. The attractions are out at the end, and the walk out offers great views . Although that pier is located on the ocean it would be nice on the lake, maybe a little smaller version. The winter ice may cancel that right out but it's only a thought.

Long Pier
 

Make an extension to the Winni Ballroom pier would be an awesome idea. Except Shoreline Protection act and the DES will put a huge NO NO on the project.

The current public docks are useless as far as I'm concerned. They should rearrange the docks wider so they can be more useful.

do you mean like this ??
 

Could be interpreted as another bridge to Governor's Island . . .

Yes, that is not the exact one in Clearwater, FL., but the exact same idea. I would vision that with provision for boat docking on either side. It could open a lot of options or just offer a nice walk with a different view perspective.

yes it is . . . .
 

This pier is located on Clearwater Beach, about 1/4 mile from the HUGE Marriott. I took the picture this February.

Sad to learn the waterslide is being torn down. I remember it much different growing up spending summers at the Weirs. My uncle has a small seasonal cottage within walking distance of the Weirs. There were, I think, four waterslides total if my memory serves me correct. No cheesy volcanoes or any other props that take away from the attraction. Even my dad and uncles went down the slides. Great memories. That volcano looked like it was about to fall over any second.

I remember getting up early and going to the country store at the top of Lakeside Ave. for the fresh donuts they made at the store. Anybody else remember those? They were the best. Learning how to waterski with the old orange life jacket. Going to the arcades to play skeeball and save up your tickets all summer to get decent prizes. Last time I visited, most of the games in the arcades were out of order and there were a few skeeball games but it just wasn't the same. How bout those bingo and poker machines with the pink rubber balls? Great times.

I'm usually a lurker but just had to throw in my two cents. Sorry to rant.

Doesn't sound like a rant to me. Rather like a trip down memory lane and a pleasant one at that! :D

Oh, sorry. That isn't the pier I had been to years ago, but just as welcoming.

Hasn't anyone taken a resent picture as to how it looks at the present time? I would love to see how the property looks vacant.:)

Rlm sorry no pic but progress is very slow for a demo project.
The Land is valued at 165k so the owners only need to rent a couple tents a year and they will be in the positive so I don't see anything happening there for a long long time.
I had an interesting conversation about my position on bike week and I realized I might be stating why bike week needs to end for the place to be rejuvenated incorrectly. The actual bike week is not the actual problem it is how it breeds lazy land owners.
I will say it again the city could have easily made a condition of approving the demo permit that unless the site is redeveloped it will not receive a bike week permit. They have placed restrictions on other properties in the area exactly like that. I know for a fact.
Also I am always amazed on how this website works. You have 95 percent of the comments saying weirs needs something done, then along comes someone who wants it to stay the same or be turned back to trees.

Clearwater vs winni
 

We are residents os st Pete beach/Clearwater and have a home on the lake for the summer . Attempting to compare the 2 isen't possible . Clearwater has a 12month season with snowbirds packing the area now and southern state folks enjoying the beaches in the summer. Also a lot more to do with the ocean and the Disney / Bush stuff so close. The lake has a very short season to make a buck and the return on investment isen't possible for large scale redevelopment. The weirs might have nostalgia but at this point it is what it is a dump that no one without a lake history will find cool.
Laconia is a financially poor city with big problems , few decent jobs and big drug and small time crime problems. Using development money to get more low paying seasonal jobs at the crummy beach probably is not at the top of the list

We avoid that area with the grand kids , it's history

I think this sums it up pretty well. Attempting to hang on to the past and nostalgia is only going to bring things down. The number of people with a "history" of the Weirs are outnumbered by newcomers who only see it as a place with little to no draw.

https://www.google.com/search?q=st+p...&client=safari

I don't recall comparing, merely suggesting a thought of a pier at Wiers beach.
I found the the one we visited. It was in St. Petersburg, FL.

http://img.tapatalk.com/d/14/04/14/nubabazu.jpghttp://img.tapatalk.com/d/14/04/14/rahu7y2a.jpg

Compare those pictures to post #43 and you'll see there has been some progress since my photo.
I think the excavator moved 35 feet.
Here's a couple pictures of the other side of the street.

Sad to see the loss of another attraction
 

Too bad that another attraction goes away with nothing to replace it. The costs of food and lodging goes up and the attractions go down. It feels odd that on one hand there is more crowding while on the other hand there are fewer entertainment destinations. Kids don't seem to mind that the Weirs are a bit run down as long as there are fun things to do there. Take away the fun and they are not pestering their parents to go there.

I wish I had answers or plan ideas but I don't. I just hate to see the current state of affairs and the dwindling number of family fun places.

I know that I'm in the minority, but I will miss the water slide. The grandkids didn't mind that it was run down. And now that it is in the process of being torn down, I just hope that they clean the debris up and not leave an unsightly empty lot.

As someone who grew up in Laconia (LHS class of '93), it's sad to see the Weirs fall into the state it's in. As a teenager, it didn't seem particularly seedy and I generally knew someone working in almost every single one of the businesses, whether it be the water slide, Surfcoaster, arcades, pizza/fried dough joints, etc. Compared to the rest of the area, the boardwalk was a pretty happening place in the summer.

Going back now, it seems much smaller and seedier than I remember. That's probably a combination if it actually being seedier and me having a slightly different world view than when I was 17.

4/16/2014
 

Today's progress photo.

4/16/2014
 

From the park.

....an empty lot with a great view!
 

Looking into my crystal ball one year from now, on April 17, 2015; I can see the Weirs Beach waterslide-volcano location has been transformed by the dynamic local market economy of Weirs Beach ........ ta-ta-ta......rat-a-tat-tat ..... a little drum-roll here ......and one year later that volcano location has become......no big surprise here..... an empty vacant lot with a surface of hard-packed dirt and some old asphalt paving here and there... some remnant tent material left over from bike week and a for sale/for lease sign.

And, what else does it have? .....oh yeah.....it has a relatively high assessed value as determined by the City of Laconia. Say-hey.....while some waterfront areas grow hotels, restaurants, and public walk-ways.....other waterfront areas just seem to grow vacant parking lots. Occaisionally, I will stop and spend money at the Cumberland gas station or at Kellerhause for a 1.09 Wednesday ice cream when driving over to Lowe's or Walmart or St Vincent de Paul. You know that the Weirs Bridge was not closed for Bike Week in 2013 for the first time due to no need to close it.

Gee whiz.....if only that lot still had a good healthy stand of hardwood trees growing there, then the trees could be cut down and sold to the lumber mill up in Rumney just like the neighboring lots up the hill which continue to be.....you guessed it.....empty lots.

ps ......I wonder why the parking meters are covered with those blue canvas covers which are locked down with a small padlock that cannot be seen in the photo.....is that to keep car-parkers from putting money into the meters?

The area needs a master plan, expecting Laconia to do this anytime soon is doubtful. I have watched the city of Laconia turn into a typical non-working, non-functional section-8 infested mess. Back in the 70s the city was a solid working-class, blue-collar type of city that was safe and stable.

There's still not much random violent crime, yet, but petty crime, property crime, and drug crimes are on the rise. The current leadership in Laconia is not going to be able to turn this around, and quite frankly, I doubt it can be turned around at all at this point due to the massive influx of section-8 housing in the core of the city. It also does not help that the Laconia area has lost thousands of manufacturing jobs.

You just can't pepper a city the size of Laconia with thousands of units of welfare housing and not expect issues. These issues are of course bleeding over to Meredith & Gilford....so this is also a regional issue, and not just a Laconia issue.

You can spend tens of millions of dollars at the Weirs and it's really not going to matter until the rest of the town is somehow cleaned up, and I don't see that happening any time soon in the current political climate.

Maybe they can pave downtown for the bikers and fix the waterfront for the tourists?

I'm not optimistic that any thing can be done in the short-term. It's taken 30 years of mismanagement to get Laconia to where it is today.

Wow. So those 100,000 bikers are not tourists? Didn't know all those bikes were from Laconia.

Perhaps a better way to say it is they are not the type of tourists the town needs. The reason for this is they are only there one week a year and while they spend heavily they seem to enable property owners to earn enough money to support run down businesses and parking lots without doing much else for the balance of the year. In a nutshell, bike week seems to crowd out capital investment which would lead to more desirable tourism. I'm sure it is a complex problem but something needs to change to improve Laconia and specifically its waterfront area.

My opinion is the blame lies on the elected officials who allow the property owners to keep Laconia looking like the south end of a north bound skunk. They issue the permits and it seems they would have leverage against property owners who depend on said permits to earn during bike week.

In the end, with the Broken Spoke and the old Boot Hill both up for sale, the writing may already be on the wall for bike week moving to Lincoln. Be careful what you wish for.

The Weirs has deteriorated because investors do not see it as a viable area to invest in new businesses.

Frankly, the old school notion of an arcade and a dance pavilion surrounded with kitschy shops doesn't cut it in the New Millenium.

Folks, particularly kids, have other options for entertainment, such as video games.

Back in the day, the Weirs was "it."

Not any more.

I've no solution, only a suggestion: hello, amusement park!

"Six Flags over Winnie," anyone?

Add a casino.

That would draw everybody.

Otherwise, it's just a slow decline to oblivion, as things change.

QUOTE=PaugusBayFireFighter;224037]My opinion is the blame lies on the elected officials who allow the property owners to keep Laconia looking like the south end of a north bound skunk. They issue the permits and it seems they would have leverage against property owners who depend on said permits to earn during bike week.

In the end, with the Broken Spoke and the old Boot Hill both up for sale, the writing may already be on the wall for bike week moving to Lincoln. Be careful what you wish for.[/QUOTE]

In this particular case, I don't think the elected officials have any real power, the blame lies in the city employees who don't seem to change and seem to focus on the wrong problems.

The city, like many, has issues to deal with. Having 100k people come to you city and spending like drunken bikers, every year can be a huge revenue tool.

If the city cannot figure out how to leverage those millions of dollars, it's hard to fault the bikers.

Does Florida blame Disney Word for their problems?

Disney world is not a run down eyesore that hasn't changed in 40 years. Disney is self policing and wouldn't let things get to that level.