By JOSEPH SAPIA
Work continues at D’Arcy’s Tavern on Bradley Beach’s Main Street, an old-style, Shore tavern closed for renovations since Jan. 2, and has a target of March 1 to re-open, according to an owner.
Tom McGill said the renovations include turning the upstairs over the bar area into a banquet room with a bar. That upstairs area, which had been an apartment and was used for storage, would be available as an overflow area from the downstairs or a rental room, McGill said.
Off the upstairs room, or what is now the roof of the first-floor dining room, will be an outside dining deck, McGill said. It will be open-sided with a roof, possibly with plastic roll-down siding for protection from the elements, he said.
The renovation includes expanding the kitchen and doing other infrastructure upgrades.
The tavern’s atmosphere will continue.
“It’s a soccer bar, sports bar, local tavern,” McGill said.
Before the tavern became D’Arcy’s in December 2007, it was the long-time Barry’s tavern, another old-style Shore bar. D’Arcy’s is named after McGill’s late father, D’Arcy McGill, who was president of the Belmar Borough Council and active in community sports programs. He died in 2002.
McGill said the building apparently dates to 1928 or so.
“It’s an old building,” McGill said. “Every time we open something up, it’s another can of worms.”
D’Arcy’s other owners are Frank Morris and Kevin Judge, both of Wall.
D’Arcy’s is at 310 Main St., between Third and Fourth Avenues.
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