Every runner's app and every trail site will tell you the same thing about Edgewater's stretch of the Hudson River Waterfront Walkway: flat, paved, roughly five miles round trip, Manhattan skyline the whole way. What they don't tell you is that the path actually stops twice inside the borough, dumps you onto River Road, and picks back up a few hundred feet later. If you've lived here a while, you already know this from muscle memory. If you're newer, you've probably hit one of those breaks mid-walk and wondered if you took a wrong turn.
Here's the part worth noticing: both breaks sit right where the borough's dining scene has gotten the most interesting in the last five months. That's not a coincidence you need to solve, just a fact worth using. This is the guide to what's actually new to eat, hear, and do along the river this August, plus the two spots where you'll need to step off the path to get there.
What Just Opened at 115 River Road
The old Pier 115 building was one of Edgewater's most recognizable restaurant addresses for years, a multi-level waterfront space with outdoor decks and unobstructed Manhattan views. It sat quiet for a stretch before springing back to life this summer as Cov, opened July 19, 2026, under owner Michael Giannopoulos, whose family also runs Blu on the Hudson in Weehawken. Culinary Director Juan Carlos "JC" Ortega, who spent years at Blu, is running the kitchen here too, with a raw bar built around East Coast oysters, dressed scallops in soy, yuzu, and wasabi, and a snapper ceviche.
Cov is open Wednesday through Sunday, 2 p.m. to 10 p.m., with a midnight close on Friday and Saturday. It's built for the golden-hour crowd more than the reservation-at-7 crowd, and the address alone tells you where it sits on the map: 115 River Road, directly on the walkway.
Down the road, a different kind of opening happened back in March 2026. Uncle Al's set up at 19 NJ-5 with a sourdough-based pizza program, betting that the area didn't have a true sourdough slice yet. It's a smaller, more everyday kind of new than Cov, open seven days a week, and it fills a gap in the borough's food scene that had nothing to do with skyline views.
Both sit on River Road. Both sit inside the stretch where the walkway doesn't actually connect.
Where the Path Actually Breaks
The Hudson River Waterfront Conservancy, the nonprofit that tracks the walkway's condition mile by mile across all nine municipalities it's supposed to run through, keeps a public list of every unfinished segment. Two of them are inside Edgewater right now.
| Location | Status | How to Get Around It |
|---|---|---|
| Center of Edgewater, between Mitsuwa Shopping Center and Edgewater Market | Vacant land, closed to the public. Construction has begun on the development that includes this walkway segment, but the Conservancy notes it will take several years to finish. | Use River Road to bypass in either direction. |
| Northern Edgewater, between Edgewater Marina and Edgewater Community Park | The private Admiral's Walk property was ordered by a court to open its section of the walkway to the public after a Conservancy lawsuit. Engineering funds have been secured and construction is expected to begin in 2026. | Use River Road to bypass in either direction. |
If that first gap sounds familiar, it's because AllTrails reviewers describe hitting it constantly: the path runs fine along the river, then ends abruptly near Trader Joe's, forcing a detour onto the sidewalk before it picks back up behind the Mitsuwa marketplace. That's not a maintenance issue. It's a property line that hasn't finished being built out, and per the Conservancy's own tracker, it won't finish soon.
The second gap sits just past the marina, which matters because that's exactly where the borough's summer concert series happens.
The Detour Runs Straight Past Dinner
Here's the actual point. When the walkway forces you onto River Road at the Mitsuwa gap, you're walking past the same stretch where Cov and Uncle Al's just opened. When it forces you onto River Road again up near the marina, you're on the same route as Don Coqui and Haven Riverfront, two more of the borough's established waterfront restaurants. The break in the path and the density of new openings sit on the same short stretch of road.
That's worth knowing if you're planning an evening rather than a workout. A walk from the center of the borough up to the marina isn't a clean riverside stroll end to end, but it is a walk that puts you within reach of everything new without adding much distance. Treat River Road as part of the route, not a detour from it, and the evening plans itself.
The Rest of an August Week Here
Two other things are worth building a week around right now, and neither one shows up on a restaurant list.
Music at the Marina has been running free concerts at the Edgewater Marina, 989 River Road, all summer, 11 shows total, and it's genuinely no-frills: no seating provided, so bring a blanket or a lawn chair, and no parking available at the marina itself, so plan to walk or bike in. Earlier this month the lineup included a rock, roll, and bagpipes set from Lenny and the Shots, which tells you the borough isn't trying to make this feel like a produced event. It's a lawn, a band, and whatever you packed.
The Edgewater Farmers Market runs Saturdays, 9 a.m. to 2 p.m., rain or shine, at the Shadyside municipal lot, through November 17. It's the one weekly fixture on this list that has nothing to do with the river at all, which is its own kind of useful if you want a reason to get out of the house that isn't waterfront-dependent.
Put those two together with a Saturday-into-Sunday routine: market in the morning, a walk up toward the marina in the evening (accepting the one detour near the community park), dinner at Cov or a slice from Uncle Al's on the way back. None of it requires a car, and most of it is free or close to it.
If you want the fuller list of the borough's parks and open spaces, including where the dog park sits and how to reach Palisades Interstate Park from the north end of town, we've covered that in more depth already.
One Date Worth Marking Before Summer Ends
The Hudson River Waterfront Walkway 10K Race and 2K Run/Walk happens Sunday, October 4, 2026, starting at the Edgewater Marina Ferry Terminal, with free parking at Veterans Field and a ferry service running participants in from Manhattan's West 39th Street terminal, about a fifteen-minute ride. It's a fast, flat, USATF-certified course, and it's a good marker for how seriously people take this stretch of river even with its unfinished sections. The walkway doesn't have to be complete to be worth showing up for.
August in Edgewater is less about picking one thing to do and more about stacking the small stuff: a Saturday market, a free concert with a lawn chair, a new raw bar at the old Pier 115 address, and a walk that will, at some point, make you step onto River Road for a stretch. That last part isn't a flaw. It's just how the town works right now, and knowing it in advance beats finding out mid-walk.
If you're already living this stretch of the Hudson and ever want a second opinion on what a property here is actually worth, or what a future move within Bergen or Hudson County might look like, The Selleck Group is a call away. No pressure to make a decision tonight. Go enjoy the concert first.
