Gillian’s Wonderland Pier in Ocean City has been transformed into something new for this upcoming summer thanks to Ocean City Pizza Company.
Pier property owner and developer Eustace Mita told NBC10 News on Thursday, May 15, that Ocean City Pizza Company would be opening as a pizza arcade at 600 Boardwalk in the Jersey Shore community in time for the start of Memorial Day weekend.
While games and pizza will be available at the location, Mita said the Wonderland amusement park rides will be absent.
“Our intention was just to make it pretty for the next summer, and then we’ll see where we go,” Mita said in an interview with NJ Advance Media. “I thought the right thing to do for all of Ocean City was to have something there.”
With the closure of the former Wonderland complex last year, Playland’s Castaway Cove is now the only theme park in Ocean City.
Mita had proposed to construct a 252-room hotel at the previously shuttered Wonderland entertainment complex. He said the new hotel would be called “ICONA in Wonderland” and feature the former amusement park’s Ferris wheel and historic carousel in the new hotel’s design.
According to NJ Advance Media, Mita intends to present his plans to the Ocean City Council in July and seek the council’s approval to declare the property an area needing redevelopment.