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Kansas City Tour Trolleys, time to bring them back!

Posted: Sat Mar 08, 2008 6:14 pm
by GRID
I miss these and I think KC really needs to find a way to bring them back.  We had these in the 90's when much of the urban core of KCMO was a joke, yet they were fun, always packed, and a great way to see the city.

Now that we have the P&L district, the Sprint Center, the Liberty Memorial, 18th and Vine etc, the crossroads, the nelson, the PAC coming, you would think that a trolley tour or open air bus tour around the core of KCMO would be a “must do” for tourists to or for those locals that need to get acquainted (or re-acquainted) with the city.

Many, if not most, cities with any kind of tourism market have them.  They could be funded by the convention bureau, the kcmo neighborhood grants, the local hotels etc.

KC doesn't have any decent tours here.  Gray Line has either pulled completely out or barely does anything here (they used to).  They too could come back with a double decker tour that I would think would be very popular here.  KC has a lot to see, especially in the summer.  I wonder how we could bring tour buses and or trolleys back?

Anybody interested in a business startup? :)

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Re: Kansas City Tour Trolleys, time to bring them back!

Posted: Sat Mar 08, 2008 6:52 pm
by ShowMeKC
resposted from my other thread

After taking a trip to Branson with some of my friends recently, I discovered a town that isn't so much like the hick/redneck center of entertainment that I expected to find. One of the neat things we saw on the landing was a trolley system running down the main pedestrian street.
It served as a quick and easy way for people to go from one end of the Landing to the other.
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Sometimes in American cities, trolleys are seen riding rails or attached to overhead wires, in a similar fashion to light rail. However in Branson, the trolley had been turned into a mini-bus.

I immediately thought about the horse-drawn carriages seen on the Plaza, and in St. Louis.
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Could this become one of the tourist attractions for Downtown? A wheel/motor based trolley system could not only enhance the atmosphere of being "Downtown", but also would provide a nice way to transport pedestrians from one part of Downtown to the other, especially in colder weather.

The trolley line would be more scenic and central to the areas most active areas, so it can serve a larger amount of citizens. Because of it's small size and ability to make tighter turns, it could go more places and make more turns along the route, avoiding highly traveled streets (save for a few).
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I will leave you with pictures of some trolley lines to give you an idea of what could be transporting people around Downtown.
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Re: Kansas City Tour Trolleys, time to bring them back!

Posted: Sat Mar 08, 2008 11:37 pm
by IraGlacialis
How about bringing back the cable cars? A straight line from the Plaza to the River Market. Perhaps on Main (and possibly going onto Grand) or Broadway.

With the hills, KC could become the San Fransisco of the Midwest (minus military-bashing hippies).

Re: Kansas City Tour Trolleys, time to bring them back!

Posted: Sun Mar 09, 2008 10:53 am
by FangKC
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Re: Kansas City Tour Trolleys, time to bring them back!

Posted: Wed Dec 06, 2017 5:26 pm
by swid
Hey, it's 2017 and we have two companies providing tourist-oriented tours of KC.

Anyway, I found a vaguely appropriate threat to post this Pitch article, wherein David Hudnall uses going on a double-decker tour as a framing device to point out that he *really* doesn't like the direction that downtown is going: https://www.pitch.com/news/article/2098 ... ansas-city

Re: Kansas City Tour Trolleys, time to bring them back!

Posted: Wed Dec 06, 2017 6:50 pm
by JBmidtown
swid wrote:Hey, it's 2017 and we have two companies providing tourist-oriented tours of KC.

Anyway, I found a vaguely appropriate threat to post this Pitch article, wherein David Hudnall uses going on a double-decker tour as a framing device to point out that he *really* doesn't like the direction that downtown is going: https://www.pitch.com/news/article/2098 ... ansas-city
Provincial, half assed leftists like him just like to stir up moral panic for the readers (which have have been dumping the Pitch exponentially for years). He’s just unhappy because KC doesn’t get to be his bombed out playground anymore. Poor baby!

Re: Kansas City Tour Trolleys, time to bring them back!

Posted: Wed Dec 06, 2017 10:29 pm
by JBmidtown
Sorry about the overreaction, that article was just the worst.

Re: Kansas City Tour Trolleys, time to bring them back!

Posted: Thu Dec 07, 2017 5:26 pm
by Imarealperson
JBmidtown wrote:
swid wrote:Hey, it's 2017 and we have two companies providing tourist-oriented tours of KC.

Anyway, I found a vaguely appropriate threat to post this Pitch article, wherein David Hudnall uses going on a double-decker tour as a framing device to point out that he *really* doesn't like the direction that downtown is going: https://www.pitch.com/news/article/2098 ... ansas-city
Provincial, half assed leftists like him just like to stir up moral panic for the readers (which have have been dumping the Pitch exponentially for years). He’s just unhappy because KC doesn’t get to be his bombed out playground anymore. Poor baby!
How does a reader “dump” a free paper? How is that even tracked?

Re: Kansas City Tour Trolleys, time to bring them back!

Posted: Thu Dec 07, 2017 6:12 pm
by chaglang
JBmidtown wrote:Sorry about the overreaction, that article was just the worst.
That article was remarkably bad.

Re: Kansas City Tour Trolleys, time to bring them back!

Posted: Thu Dec 07, 2017 6:30 pm
by JBmidtown
Imarealperson wrote:
JBmidtown wrote:
swid wrote:Hey, it's 2017 and we have two companies providing tourist-oriented tours of KC.

Anyway, I found a vaguely appropriate threat to post this Pitch article, wherein David Hudnall uses going on a double-decker tour as a framing device to point out that he *really* doesn't like the direction that downtown is going: https://www.pitch.com/news/article/2098 ... ansas-city
Provincial, half assed leftists like him just like to stir up moral panic for the readers (which have have been dumping the Pitch exponentially for years). He’s just unhappy because KC doesn’t get to be his bombed out playground anymore. Poor baby!
How does a reader “dump” a free paper? How is that even tracked?
I believe it’s tracked by dropping ad revenue, unique visitors to website, and possibly even how many copies are requested from businesses or picked up at boxes.

Re: Kansas City Tour Trolleys, time to bring them back!

Posted: Fri Dec 08, 2017 12:07 pm
by flyingember
JBmidtown wrote:
Imarealperson wrote:
JBmidtown wrote:
Provincial, half assed leftists like him just like to stir up moral panic for the readers (which have have been dumping the Pitch exponentially for years). He’s just unhappy because KC doesn’t get to be his bombed out playground anymore. Poor baby!
How does a reader “dump” a free paper? How is that even tracked?
I believe it’s tracked by dropping ad revenue, unique visitors to website, and possibly even how many copies are requested from businesses or picked up at boxes.
Twitter views are a big part these days. Every person in the media in KC basically has an account they post from on top of the corporate account.

He lost me at
all I can think is that the best thing about Kansas City — that it’s cheap to live here — is slipping away before my eyes.
And his whining that a coffee that's $3.50 is $5. Apparently losing 10% of your money is the same as spending

This whole piece just comes across as insensitive and tone deaf

Re: Kansas City Tour Trolleys, time to bring them back!

Posted: Sun Dec 10, 2017 6:55 pm
by chaglang
>Find a thing that was true about KC 20 years ago but isn’t anymore
>>link it to something unrelated that bothers you about KC now
>>>write Pitch article