The Long Beach Boardwalk's First New Rule Since 1986 Isn't About Drinking on the Boardwalk

If you've heard anything about the Long Beach boardwalk this year, it's probably some version of "they finally lifted the alcohol ban." That's the headline that traveled fastest after the April 7 City Council meeting, and it's also the part city officials spent the most time correcting on the record. Council President Brendan Finn said it plainly at that same meeting: alcohol is still not permitted on the boardwalk or the beach, and open containers remain banned in both places. City Manager Dan Creighton opened the session by saying the same thing before anyone could ask.

So nothing changed about walking the boardwalk with a beer in hand. What actually changed is which businesses along that boardwalk are now allowed to serve alcohol inside their own walls, and that distinction is the more interesting story if you live here, because it quietly rewrites what kind of restaurant can survive on the boardwalk at all.

Header photo courtesy of: Tulum Tacos & Tequila 

The Rule That Shaped Four Decades of Snack Stands

The ordinance the council amended dates to 1986. For most of the time it's been on the books, it capped the number of bars in the city and blocked any business with an opening onto the boardwalk from selling alcohol, full stop. That's not a small technical detail. It's the reason the boardwalk has spent a generation as a strip of concession stands and quick-service counters rather than restaurants people sit down at for two hours. You can't run a 200-seat dinner room on burger and ice cream margins alone. You need a bar tab.

The city's own Corporation Counsel, Greg Kalnitsky, made an interesting admission during that same meeting: over the last 13 years, the zoning board had heard 18 applications for new establishments or bar expansions, and approved every single one. In other words, the city had already been granting exceptions quietly for over a decade before it decided to change the rule out loud. The April vote didn't invent a new appetite for boardwalk dining. It formalized one that had been leaking through variances for years.

Here's the timeline, start to finish:

1. 1986 - The city bans alcohol sales at boardwalk-facing businesses and caps the number of bars citywide.
2. 2013 to 2026 - The zoning board quietly approves all 18 variance requests it receives for new or expanded bar space, without changing the underlying law.
3. April 7, 2026 - After a meeting that drew more than 200 residents and business owners and ran past three hours on a single agenda item, the City Council votes unanimously to lift the moratorium and allow boardwalk-facing storefronts to serve alcohol on their own premises.
4. July 2026 - Tulum Taco Stand opens on the boardwalk as a counter-service preview of what's coming.
5. August 2026 - Hacienda Tulum, the year-round restaurant behind that taco stand, begins its soft opening.
6. September 2026 - Hacienda Tulum's full debut, right now, as the first true sit-down, alcohol-serving restaurant the boardwalk has had since the ordinance went into effect.

Not Every Boardwalk Business Gets to Cash In

Here's the part that gets lost when people shorthand this as "the boardwalk can serve alcohol now." The ordinance only applies to businesses with an actual storefront opening onto the boardwalk, and each one still has to get its own liquor license approved by the New York State Liquor Authority. The city vote didn't hand out permits. It removed a local barrier so businesses could apply for a state one.

That matters because it draws a real line between two kinds of businesses that have coexisted on the boardwalk for years. On one side are the city-run concession buildings, the kind that have anchored specific blocks for decades: Driftwood at Grand Boulevard, Riptides 11561 at Edwards Boulevard, Skudin Surf at Riverside Boulevard, and Shakes and Shuckers at Lincoln Boulevard. These operate under city concession agreements built around a seasonal, walk-up model. On the other side is new ground-up retail space, like the Superblock development at 180 Boardwalk, built from scratch with proper restaurant infrastructure and a lease that specifically anticipates full liquor service.

That's why, of everyone on the boardwalk, only two businesses had already filed for on-premises liquor permits with the state before the council even voted: Tulum Tacos and Tequila and Riptides 11561. Everyone else on that stretch is either structurally set up for a different kind of business, or hasn't decided to make the leap yet.

What's Actually Landing This September

Tulum Tacos and Tequila is the family behind this shift, and the Long Beach location is their third on Long Island after Mineola and Baldwin. Owner Nicolas Geeraerts opened the counter-service Tulum Taco Stand in July as a way to start serving beachgoers while construction continued next door on the real project: Hacienda Tulum, a roughly 200-seat restaurant built to run year-round, not just through beach season.

The menu leans into what the taco stand can't do. Four different mole sauces, each requiring about ten days of preparation, headline the kitchen. One dish pairs black truffle mole with flautas. The smoked tuna ceviche that's already a favorite at the taco stand gets a more refined plating inside. There's a 24-seat private dining room, and a hidden 20-seat speakeasy planned to open several months after the main restaurant, tucked into the back.

The project also tackles something every Long Beach summer resident already complains about. Hacienda Tulum comes with a private 100-space parking garage with direct elevator access into the dining room, separate from the parking reserved for the attached condo and apartment building. Weekend valet is planned on top of that.

Geeraerts has been careful about how he frames the concept, especially given the noise concerns that came up repeatedly at the April council meeting. His lease keeps the restaurant closed after 11 p.m. "We are not opening a nightclub," he said at that meeting. "We are opening up a first-class establishment. A Mexican eatery and speakeasy."

The Boardwalk Has Always Served Food. It Hasn't Always Served This.

None of this is the boardwalk's first brush with food culture. A local history account traces boardwalk dining back to the mid-1950s, when Arnold Gutin's Hebrew National restaurant and deli sat at 65 West Boardwalk and Bob's Pizza held down 79 West Boardwalk, with Kalin's shops serving frozen custard and ices nearby. Food has been part of the boardwalk's identity for seven decades. What's new is the format. Hacienda Tulum is being built as a year-round, full-service, liquor-licensed restaurant in a spot that has never had one, on a strip that spent 1986 through 2026 structurally limited to concessions and quick-service counters.

That's also why Barrier Beets, the health-conscious counter at 190 Boardwalk that opened in 2025, and the rest of the current lineup along Grand, Edwards, Riverside, Lincoln, and Pacific Boulevards still make sense as they are. They were never trying to be dinner destinations. Hacienda Tulum is the first boardwalk business actually built around that ambition, and the ordinance change is the reason it can exist at all.

What This Means If You Live Here

The practical version for anyone who walks this boardwalk regularly: expect one new restaurant this fall, not a wave of them. The state licensing step alone slows things down, and most of the boardwalk's existing footprint is still built around the seasonal concession model that's worked for decades. But the precedent now exists. If Hacienda Tulum's year-round format works on a stretch that has never supported one before, it becomes the template other boardwalk-facing spaces can point to the next time they're deciding whether a full liquor license is worth pursuing.

For now, the honest way to describe what changed isn't "you can drink on the boardwalk." It's that after 40 years, one specific kind of business finally has a legal path to exist there, and this September, a restaurant that would have been impossible under the old rule opens its doors.

If you're weighing what a fall or winter in Long Beach actually looks like, from the boardwalk on down to which streets put you closest to it, Lucky To Live Here knows this stretch of the barrier island block by block. Reach out anytime you want a local read on what's changing here and what it means for you.