Sun News - Two local businessmen want to see people soaring over Withers Swash as they ride a mechanized zipline-style chair attraction they are proposing to build on the South End of Myrtle Beach. At Wednesday’s Downtown Redevelopment Corp. meeting, Chris Trout, one of the owners and the general manager of the Sky Wheel, presented a plan to build a moveable zipline inside the grounds of Family Kingdom. He and Bill Prescott, who owns the Slingshot and other downtown attractions, have joined forces on this new venture, and want to make the 400-foot line traverse Withers Swash and the go-kart track on Fourth Avenue South. Instead of each rider being harnessed to a zip line, though, each would sit in a chair with safety belts, and get a speed-controlled round-trip ride up to 60 feet in the air. Unlike a zipline course, there would be no stairs to climb to get to the line.
Redevelopment agency Executive Director David Sebok said he thought it was a good idea to get feedback from the redevelopment board before the proposal moves on to the City Council for approval. The council will have to consider whether to grant Trout and Prescott the right to use the city’s air space and rights of way. The council usually asks what other stakeholders think of a project, Sebok said, and now Trout and Prescott will be able to answer that question. The board unanimously approved supporting the project, although there was some discussion about whether riders would be restricted from carrying items with them on the ride, as zipliners are. "I think one concern (for the City Council) is going to be the amount of trash that ends up in the swash,” said board member Chuck Martino, himself a former City Council member.
If this new plan is approved, it will be the third zipline-style adventure ride for Myrtle Beach. The other two, owned by Myrtle Beach Adrenaline Adventures, are being placed on the smaller lot of the former Pavilion site, and in a vacant lot on the South End of Ocean Boulevard between Damon’s restaurant and Springmaid Pier. Those two courses are in the construction and permitting process now, and their developers plan to be open for the peak summer season, as do Trout and Prescott. In other business Wednesday, the board unanimously voted to pay about $25,000 for decorative paving on the large lot of the former Pavilion site downtown, which this year will be used for Coastal Uncorked’s tasting arena. The food-and-wine festival, now in its third year, is abandoning its tasting trolleys for a stationary tasting area, and proposing leasing the former Pavilion site for the late-April event.
The plan calls for food and wine tasting tents and a temporary stage with about 500 chairs, plus the paved area that the redevelopment agency will pay for. The hope is that other groups will want to use the paved area once Coastal Uncorked is over, and Sebok said he has had inquiries from groups that are considering wine-tasting events and a Native American powwow. “I think it’s a good thing for downtown,” said board member Karon Mitchell, who owns the Chesterfield Inn, among other properties along the boulevard. Board member Taylor Damonte, director of the Clay Brittain Jr. Center for Resort Tourism at Coastal Carolina University, said the board should support Coastal Uncorked. His center has performed economic impact studies of the festival, and conservatively, he said, it has a $3 million direct impact on the city. "If they want a $20,000 paving pad to make the site more usable,” he said, “it’s a no-brainer.”
The redevelopment staff is also considering asking the board to pay for electricity and water at the site, so that even more groups could use it. The paving will all be removed when the property is redeveloped, but landowner The Burroughs & Chapin Co., Inc., has not said when that will happen. In the meantime, the company is leasing the property for a variety of uses, from festivals to the traveling display of the Vietnam Memorial Wall that has come to town for Veterans Day. The board also voted unanimously in favor of enhancing its storefront-improvement loan program. As it stands now, property owners can borrow up to $15,000 to make improvements to their building facades. But since the program started in 2001, only three property owners have used the loan program. Redevelopment Executive Assistant Koribrett McKeithan said that’s partly because the cost of improvements designs can be prohibitive. Board members agreed to give grants of up to $2,000 to pay for the designs, on top of the loans. The board has $48,000 set aside for loans, which are given out on a first-come, first-served basis.
