Good Luck Point A Ghost Town 11 Months After Superstorm Sandy

By Patricia A. Miller

The phragmites have grown so tall in the late summer sun you can no longer see where the storm surge breached that dark October night in 2012.

But it's clear when you head down Dorrance Drive in Good Luck Point that something is very wrong.

What was once a thriving little community of year-round and summer residents in this tiny section of Bayville on the Barnegat Bay is gone.

The "Children at Play" sign is almost obscured by a young cedar. There are very few cars in driveways. Only the fortunate ones whose homes were raised high on this spit of land surrounded by tidal marshes made it.

No one lives in the little ranch houses anymore. No one has lived in them since Oct. 29, 2012, when Superstorm Sandy pummeled Good Luck Point into near-oblivion.

One house still has a paper pumpkin in the window and a faded scarecrow tethered to the mailbox. Round the bend onto Good Luck Drive and it gets worse. Many of the battered houses are still standing, waiting to be torn down. Neon-orange condemnation stickers adorn front doors.

The homes look even worse than they did a few months ago. Foundations are crooked, doors don't sit right in their jambs. Some of the walls are starting to cave in. Windows are broken. Sections of shingle and wallboard disappeared that night, leaving the houses at the mercy of the storm.

There are more empty lots, as houses slowly come down. The silence is palpable, broken only occasionally by workers with saws atop pilings on a lot down the street.

There are many who think Superstorm Sandy is a faded memory, old news. Take a ride through Good Luck Point and think again.