DAYTONA BEACH — A required beach access pedestrian walkway on the northern boundary of the controversy-plagued construction site of the $192 million Protogroup twin-tower hotel-condominium project was closed again this week, at least for a time, just as Bike Week visitors started to arrive for the annual 10-day event.
“We come down here every year and I don’t know how you get down to the ocean anymore,” said Perry Schafer, 60, a guest at the 10-room Sea Dunes hotel, located at the base of the Protogroup’s South Tower at the intersection of Oakridge Boulevard and North Atlantic Avenue.
Schafer has been making the annual trek from his home in Omaha, Nebraska, to Bike Week for six years, joining a group of friends that has been meeting at the Sea Dunes for nearly 20 years during the event, which officially opens Friday this year.