Waco's visitor center will soon move right next to the city's biggest tourist attraction, leaving behind its longtime spot next to the Texas Ranger Hall of Fame and Museum.
The Waco City Council on Tuesday approved an agreement for the city to lease a new downtown space at 323 S. Sixth St. to serve as Waco's new Welcome Center, placing the center in a more prominent location in the city.
Waco's new visitor center is set to open later this year at 323 S. Sixth St., right next to the AC Hotel and just down the street from the Magnolia Market in the silos.
Rod Aydelotte, Tribune-Herald
The new visitor center will be in a commercial space built next to the new AC Hotel and just down the road from the Magnolia Market at the silos and the Dr Pepper Museum.
Annual rent and maintenance is expected to cost a little more than $22,000, and finishing the space and furnishing is expected to cost about $950,000, according to information filed in the 'town hall.
The location was strategically chosen due to its proximity to two of Waco's main tourist attractions, as the current location, adjacent to the Texas Ranger Hall of Fame and Museum, is somewhat hidden and does not receive as many visitors as the staff at the city. .
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Convention and Tourism Director Dan Quandt said with the continued development and revitalization of downtown, the city felt it was time to move the visitor information center to where the real visitors are. The Ranger Museum's current location is well visited, averaging about 50,000 a year, but is located on the old Fort Fisher Campground next to a cemetery and the Texas Ranger Museum. It is accessible only from the Interstate 35 access road.
Waco Convention and Tourism Director Dan Quandt said he expects traffic at the city's visitor center to quadruple when it moves to a new location near Magnolia Market at the silos and the Dr Pepper Museum. The center has operated in a hidden building next to the Texas Ranger Hall of Fame and Museum since the 1980s.
Rod Aydelotte, Tribune-Herald
The city council approved plans for the current visitor center in 1985, a time when Waco was not known for tourism. Most of the visitors were Baylor University alumni who came to town for the football games. That all changed in the mid-2010s after the popularity of the Waco-based home renovation show “Fixer Upper” hosted by Chip and Joanna Gaines, and the October 2015 opening of the Magnolia Market headquarters in Silos. According to numbers from the Waco Convention and Visitors Bureau, the number of visitors to Waco jumped from 780,000 in 2015 to 2.1 million in 2016.
Fort Fisher Park still hosted overnight campers and a series of events when the City of Waco signed off on plans to build a visitor information center there in 1985. Now, the Texas Ranger Hall of Fame and Museum is the main attraction of the area, limiting foot traffic to the visitor center.
Rod Aydelotte, Tribune-Herald
The new visitor center will be larger than the current center, 3,111 square feet compared to 2,000 square feet in the current building. It will include an expanded range of merchandise, video screens providing information on Waco tourist attractions and will feature regular events such as live music to entertain guests, Quandt said.
“We're known for Magnolia and we're proud to be known for Magnolia,” Quandt said. “We need to tell people there's so much more to Waco than just Magnolia. We need to bring more people to the Waco Mammoth site or the zoo or the Texas Ranger Museum, even across the street to the Dr Pepper” .
Quandt said the video screens will also display information about local restaurants and retail stores for tourists to visit. He said the expanded range of Waco-themed merchandise equates to more marketing for the city, likening a visitor who buys and wears a Waco-branded T-shirt to a portable billboard.
The new visitor center will offer more space than the current center and will feature an expanded range of Waco-themed merchandise.
Rod Aydelotte, Tribune-Herald
Although the current building, which opened in the 1980s, averages a decent number of visitors per year, Quandt said the building is often mistaken for a ticket office for the Ranger Museum, as wayward tourists poke their heads in before fleeing to the adjacent museum. Quandt said that with the increased visibility of being located downtown next to prominent attractions and not tucked away and tucked away, he expects the number of annual visitors to quadruple.
Quandt said the new visitor center will be open by the end of the year. The initial lease will be for 10 years, with two five-year renewal options.
Waco's new visitor center is set to open later this year at 323 S. Sixth St., right next to the AC Hotel and just down the street from the Magnolia Market in the silos.
Rod Aydelotte, Tribune-Herald
