As was rumored last week, after six years of fun in the sun, city construction has killed the Long Island City Water Taxi Beach. The villain who slayed the beach? The need to build combined storm water sewer outfalls for the new Hunters Point South development.

Tom Fox, the company's founder, broke the news in a teary letter earlier today (below). Though the company tried to persuade the city to let them build a new beach just down the road—with "a nine-hole miniature golf course and a better volleyball court configuration!"—it was sadly not to be. The new plan for Hunters Point South includes a beach though, so this may not be the end of LIC beaching. In the meantime, this year the only Water Taxi Beaches will be on Governors Island and the South Street Seaport. Sort of.

At a Community Board meeting last night Fox announced plans to turn that apparently money-losing beach into an outdoor upscale German beer garden called Pier Garten. The restaurant's preliminary menu includes German staples like bratwurst, along with a range of beers. The biggest downer in that news? In making the switch to bratwursts and brews the space is going to lose the sand. Sigh!

Meanwhile, Harry Hawk of Harry's @ Water Taxi Beach had this to say about the news: "The whole project almost didn't happen because the location was supposed to be the 2012 Olympic Village. After that we knew it was always a temporary amenity. The Port Authority then and now EDC get a lot of credit for allowing it to happen. That there is a beach in the long term plans shows the real impact of Harry's @ Water Taxi Beach on NYC."

Want to mope about the news for a moment? Just look at how the beach looked in 2006! Also, we will never forget the QBQ BBQ we hosted there with A Hamburger Today way back in 2006 and in 2007. Oh, memories.

Here's the letter from Tom Fox announcing the end: