Catch a trolley ride at Balloon Fiesta
Retro vehicles join fleet of people-movers at Albuquerque event
Averaging more than 100,000 visitors to Balloon Fiesta Park on each of the nine days of the Albuquerque International Balloon Fiesta, getting people from one place to another is a major undertaking for fiesta officials that should be a little easier this year.
“We have known forever that we have a people-moving issue with fiesta,” said Chuck Clark, a member of the fiesta’s board of directors.
Whether it’s getting people from the parking areas to the ticket gates, or return trips to their cars, or moving them about the field, the logistics can be complicated.
“We’ve all seen people there with endurance or mobility issues who want to see the entire array of things on the field but can’t do it, or at the end of the day can’t get off the field and get back to the parking area without assistance,” he said.
Fiesta officials recently invested $50,000 in the purchase of four diesel-powered trolley cars previously owned by the city of Austin, Texas, to move people around the fiesta grounds, from parking lots to
launch sites.
Two of the refurbished trolleys will be ready by Saturday, the start of fiesta. The other two are in Dallas having their engines rebuilt at a cost of about $30,000.
Each of the retro San Francisco-style trolleys is about 32 feet long, equipped with a front-door wheelchair lift, and can sit about 25 people. Another 25 standing passengers can grasp brass vertical and overhead horizontal poles.
“The trolleys are beautiful and we will use them on the hills (in the park) because they’re stout and have heavyduty diesel engines,” said fiesta board member Jim Garcia. “We’ll take people from the areas where there are steep grades, drop them off at the ticket areas adjacent to the field and at the end of the day will take people from the field to the waiting areas on top.”
The trolleys will join a fleet of about 40 golf carts that on average carry a driver and three passengers but struggle to get up and down the steeper slopes. There are also two trailers pulled by pickup trucks that can each ferry about 20 people.
The golf carts are frequently used to transport people around the field, and this year one of the pickup trucks will also be used for that purpose, Garcia said.
The fiesta also rents about a dozen school buses to shuttle people from off-site parking on Balloon Fiesta Parkway and from the recreational vehicle area south of the Balloon Museum off Alameda.
About 20 pedestrian stops for shuttle rides will be marked with 20-foot-tall, feathershaped flags, eight of them on the field, he said. There is no cost for any of the on-field or parking area shuttle rides.
When the remaining two trolleys are put into service for subsequent fiestas, at least one of them may provide on-field transportation.
The trolley cars will be street legal and could generate money for the fiesta during the off season. Private businesses already have inquired about renting them for special occasions, Clark said, and additional revenue could be realized from trolley advertising panels.