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.
I appreciate this discussion. I’m curious where the liability would fall if a head on occurs on 101 with someone trying to pass this “trolley” going to the cape. Is this project open to potentially “returning to the dead” (interestingly appropriate moment of clarity/observation, no?)
There are case studies here. This feels important enough to put the brakes on asap, pun intended. Thank you fellow concerned citizens.
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
I’d rather have our street lights back on Ocean View Drive that the previous administration had removed with no input or regards to safety.
I live in Eugene and come to Yachats often. I think it’s a great idea. And families will enjoy it as well as elderly tourists who have difficulty getting around town looking for parking etc. I vote yes.
Needed projects that improve the lives of actual residents get shoved aside in the never ending enticements for tourists. How about some road repairs for the potholes and erosion on Greenhill, Crestview and Overlook??
The trolley is a fantastic idea and I can’t wait to hop on with visiting family and friends. Yachats is a tourist driven town and if you naysayers can’t see that they bring big dollars to help with infrastructure, I don’t know if you can be helped.
I had hoped this idea would go away. What would the route be? Have they polled the homeowners who will be affected? If someone takes the trolley from one place to another is there assurance they can get back to their original destination. I need more details about the route and the timing before I can feel good about this.
And all we want over here in Cedar Avenue, speaking for myself only, is a little patch of asphalt up at the corner with Second Street to keep the gravel from continually washing out and down our street. But I’d have been a firm no on this trolley, the tree cutting debacle, the log church black hole, and taking the Landmark property off of the tax rolls. Seriously, this town acts as if it has money to burn.
This is an real embarrassment. The compulsive cheerleaders among us have spoiled a good many cool little towns with over-promotion. Straight out of Disneyland.
I appreciate the efforts of the City and it’s amazing volunteers. I feel Yachats needs to focus on it’s infrastructure. Energy resilience, roads, water and planning. Public transportation is a good fit. Will the trolley be free and guaranteed to stay that way? Will it make pull stops at unscheduled locations? Will it run year round especially in the winter when it can benefit residents? What do operating expenses look like over 1, 5, 10 years? I like services that benefit residents and tourism alike. I hope that an investment like this gets the vetting it deserves.
Another Yachats boondoggle. I live in Kona, Hawaii part of the year and they had a fleet of trollies that no one rode so they shut them down. Kona has over 44,000 visitors a day, how many does Yachats have?