Friday, May 17, 2024
When a solar eclipse darkens the sky over Gatesville and much of Central Texas for more than four minutes on April 8, 2024, thousands of people are expected to pour into the area to view the rare event, and the city of Gatesville is preparing for it.
Cheri Shepherd, who was hired as the city's special events coordinator, is helping to oversee plans to make the influx of visitors go as smoothly as possible, and also to make the event as beneficial as possible for both visitors and local residents.
"This is going to be a pretty big deal," Shepherd told the Gatesville City Council. "In 1979, there was a total eclipse over the U.S., and in 2017 an eclipse affected other parts of the country. After 2024, it will be another 20 years before another eclipse passes over the U.S."
Gatesville is identified as a prime viewing area for the eclipse, which will not be visible in many parts of the state, including the Houston area. That means many of those located outside the eclipse zone will flock to areas in which the eclipse will be prominent.
"Texas will have a tremendous amount of tourism because of this," Shepherd said. "We can't predict if Gatesville will have 10,000 or 20,000 extra people on the day of the eclipse, but we know people are coming, and we want to prepare for it.
"The number one thing is public safety. We want to keep our residents safe and our visitors safe - we don't want to make national headlines for being the biggest (eclipse-related) disaster in the U.S. My focus will also be on helping businesses prepare. We'll probably do a townhall meeting.
"We will start to promote general public awareness so people know what impact this will have for the community and down the road. There's a great opportunity, and we can't let it slip by."
Because traffic is expected to significantly increase in the days leading up to the eclipse, the police department's resources will be stretched, and Shepherd said having local events to promote the eclipse will help to offset those costs.
"There is a possibility of offering camping at Faunt Le Roy Park at a reasonable rate. We can possibly have a downtown event Saturday and Sunday (the eclipse will be on a Monday)," Shepherd said. "People are going to be here and looking around for something to do. We could have a downtown festival kind of event with food trucks and music and provide something for people to do.
"This is not really a city event, it's an event for the community, as we want to work together as a community."
Shepherd said she is exploring the possibility of offering something at the civic center that could be catered.
"Our local restaurants are probably going to be strained by this," she said. "We need to look at what's open and identify needs."
She referred to plans by the Gatesville Independent School District to have a special viewing event at McKamey Stadium (see related story).
"That's going to be a great thing to have," Shepherd said. "It will have a lot of people in one place with proper parking. The school district will benefit financially - it will be a positive for the school district."
Shepherd said a NASA ambassador is planning to be in Gatesville and will bring telescopes and a crew of people to educate people on the eclipse the Saturday before the event.
"We need to do some marketing and merchandising," she said. "Everything we do will pay for itself. A lot of people will be interested in buying a shirt or something related to the eclipse. We are working with a local artist. Vintage Royalty (a local boutique) has the first Gatesville eclipse T-shirt, and there will also be other items."
Gatesville Police Chief Brad Hunt said it's important to provide a safe place for people to congregate and park, instead of having them park on streets or up and down the highway.
"The more we can have a focus on things, the better," he said. "It's all public safety oriented. We are already hearing reports of people opening their pastures to campers. We'll help those within the community promote what they're doing."
He also referred to the movie National Lampoon's Christmas Vacation in which Cousin Eddie emptied his camper's waste disposal system into a sewer line, resulting in disaster, and said it's important to avoid such occurrences.
Mayor Gary Chumley noted, "There's only one RV cleanout (in the city) other than those owned by private entities, and it is sorely lacking. We need to look at adding something because people are going to dump (RV waste)."
Hunt said what keeps him up at night is thinking about the 2017 eclipse's impact in Illinois "when the whole state was a traffic jam for 12 hours. Even if we did nothing, we know we'll have traffic coming through. We will have police substations on different sides of town. There could be two million people visiting Texas for the eclipse."
