By GARRET JAROS/YachatsNews
YACHATS – Yachats is getting a trolley.
Memorial Day will not be the only thing that rolls around in May after the Yachats city council Wednesday approved purchasing and funding a tourist-style trolley to shuttle visitors and locals between hotels, campgrounds, downtown and beyond to Cape Perpetua.
The idea to bring a trolley to town to attract tourists while also meeting the city’s goals to ease parking and traffic congestion in an environmentally-friendly way was ushered in by city manager Bobbi Price in August 2023. Price, who at that time was the executive director of the Yachats Area Chamber of Commerce, proposed the idea to city officials after seeing a trolley in operation while on vacation in Pacific City.
“I feel optimistic that a trolley would be well received and utilized by both visitors and locals,” Price said at the time. “And I believe destination management is just as important as destination promotion alone.”
With that in mind, the chamber along with the city decided to put feelers out to get feedback from the public. The idea had its detractors but surveys and community discussions showed overwhelming support from locals and visitors.
The city and the chamber each applied for $100,000 grants under Travel Oregon’s accessible and inclusive program to cover the cost of purchasing a $220,000, 14-seat, hybrid trolley complete with wheelchair capabilities.
The chamber received a grant. The city did not. The reason given was that the city is not a “tourism-facing entity.” Not to be detoured, the council voted in January to apply for a U.S. Department of Transportation grant worth $1 million to $25 million. That was also denied.
Despite the speed bumps, the chamber began casting about to see who else might provide the $100,000 before its grant, which has to be used by April, reverts back to Travel Oregon.
That is when the Oregon Coast Visitors Association stepped in to “express interest in partnering” with the city and the chamber to provide the missing $100,000 for a project it said aligns with surveys it has done that show a need for “micro transportation” in tourist-destination coastal communities, now-city manager Price told the council Wednesday.
The chamber has set aside an additional $20,000 to cover the purchase price, leaving the city to cover an estimated $90,000 in annual operating costs for maintenance, insurance and driver-associated expenses.
“All of those things can be paid for with transient lodging tax,” said Price, who advised council to move quickly if it was still interested before the chamber loses its grant Dec 15. The grant also requires the trolley be up and running by Memorial Day weekend.
“I would like to go forward with this if truly Oregon Coast Visitors Association can come through with that money,” Price said. “And look to different opportunities where we could potentially contract the drivers.”
Price would like to see all duties related to driving contracted out.
“We are kind of to this point now where it’s been brought up many times and we have a decision to make – do we want to just stop the conversation or do we want to use grant money and purchase it …?” Price asked the council.
Councilor Barry Collins said it “seems like a project that has returned from the dead” and that he was onboard. The mayor and the other councilors, save for Anthony Muirhead who was not in attendance, agreed and made a motion to move to put the pedal to the metal.
Price will now return to Oregon Coast Visitors Association to confirm its promise of funds. If that happens, the trolley will be purchased and transferred to the city as quickly as possible.
The trolley, which may look like the faux San Francisco cable car depending on what a yet-to-be-formed advisory committee recommends, is built by Hometown Trolleys of Wisconsin.
- Garret Jaros is YachatsNews’ full-time reporter and can be reached at GJaros@YachatsNews.com
Pure cringe. Unnecessary and perhaps ridiculous? Sadly anachronistic. For some reason, this makes me think of a nightmare Fellini had.
I’d be happy to offer what perhaps most everyone in this town is thinking — for example, Crestview is basically washed out from the storm, yes, the road that goes to the water tower. Overlook doesn’t even have a sewer line in it and it’s inside the city limits.
True economics says this will cost way more than a quarter million just in downline costs. This is laughing stock material. Think about it.
The trolley will be sold for a loss and people will look back on this with regret.
I’m just curious if anybody else has the same opinion? Besides being utterly doomed to fail, it will make us feel it just an out of place cringy oddity we all have to see it drive by…
Similar response, but not as eloquently delivered. Where will trolley riders (if tourists) park? Just baffled that it feels like a necessity to the council.
Spend, spend, spend. No project is left unfunded by the Yachats City Council, no matter how unjustified. Reference to recent spending on stopping tree cutting south of town, the Little Log Church, the new city Library, acquiring property to build the Yellow Brick Road for the upgrade of the walking trail along Ocean View Drive and now spending for a Trolley to cause traffic problems along 101 so our visitors don’t have to walk to dinner or shopping. Unbelievable