What is the lure for Moses Lake?
What is the lure for Moses Lake?
Developer Brooks gives outsider's perspective as part of city tourism plan
MOSES LAKE — Roger Brooks and his wife circled the Moses Lake business loop on Broadway Avenue three times on a recent visit to the city, and he said she didn't find the downtown shopping district until after he pointed it out.
Brooks had been to the city before and highlighted the moment, saying the city has a need for signs directing shoppers into the downtown core. The CEO of Olympia-based Destination Development, Brooks presented the ups and downs of the city Thursday night at a meeting aimed at showing a visitor's perspective on Moses Lake.
"First impressions are lasting impressions," Brooks said Thursday, telling the audience the impression a visitor will get traveling down Broadway Avenue is much different than the impression of someone who takes that route daily.
Before Brooks' presentation, Parks and Recreation Director Spencer Grigg told the roughly 40 people in the audience at Moses Lake SkillSource that Brooks would tell them the good, the bad and the ugly about Moses Lake. Brooks himself said his discussion was meant to be a conversation starter.
Thursday's was the first of several public meetings Brooks plans to hold in Moses Lake this year, and was designed as an honest look at the shopping experience through the eyes of a visitor like himself. He will now be doing research and interviews in the city with the eventual goal of a city brand for tourist marketing.
Brooks signed a one-year contract with the city earlier this year, to create the plan officials hope would turn the city into a tourist and economic development lure. The three- to five-year plan will include marketing and design concepts which the city will then try and implement.
"Whatever your brand is in Moses Lake, whatever you want to be," Brooks said that's what the city should make its signs look like. Brooks showed examples in communities from Washington to Rhode Island where wayfinding signage has helped guarantee them a return on their investment.
Moses Lake has tourism potential, but Brooks said the city's businesses and community leaders have some work to do if they want to bring people to the downtown area. For Brooks, one of the major problems is directional and distance signage, or lack thereof.
One sign on Highway 17 promises a "desert oasis," but Brooks cautioned the city not to hang their hat on the promise if they couldn't deliver it. He said the oasis theme only lasts about 30 seconds before visitors are sprung upon the concrete of Broadway avenue or Pioneer Way.
"You must deliver on the promise," Brooks said. " As we're traveling up and down Broadway we didn't see much of an oasis on it, I'm sorry."
He said facilities like city parks are great additions, but outsiders need to have the signs or directions to get them to the aquatic center or amphitheater.
While the city may lack directional signage, Brooks highlighted several examples of how the area is plagued by temporary signs advertising beer and other sales. To clean up the view for visitors, Brooks suggested restricting temporary signs and beautifing the area with additions like landscaping.
He also encouraged putting rest rooms and 24-hour visitor information centers with brochures in places people will stop, and in downtown areas. Brooks saw the activity trail signs, but could not find a trail map to use them.
But to get to that critical mass, Brooks said businesses need to follow his "10-10-10" rule. In three linear blocks, Brooks said a downtown area should have 10 businesses that sell food, 10 businesses that are destination retail, and 10 businesses that are open after 5 p.m. The third 10 could pose a problem for Moses Lake, Brooks said, describing the city's downtown as a "ghost town" at about 5:30 p.m. Thursday.
Brooks singled out one restaurant on W. Broadway Avenue in which the lack of landscaping windows left him to question whether the restaurant is ever, or even, open. He gave praise, however, to a few local businesses that take the time and effort each day to put flowers and flags and other items in front of their establishments to try and draw people in.
Part of Brooks' suggestions of narrowing the streets in the downtown area are something the city is doing right now. The city's downtown reconstruction project is scheduled to begin in late July, with narrower streets slated to come to a one and a half block section of Third Avenue.
In creating a lure, Brooks asked the audience what they have that a resident of King County can't get closer to home? He suggested starting small and having the business association and chamber of commerce market one business they know will attract out-of-town visitors, pulling them into other shops as well.
"Radio Shack doesn't advertise when it's in a mall because Nordstrom pulls them in," Brooks said.
City associate planner Lori Barlow found the presentation full of little details the city can take on. She said Brooks provided the ideas for distance signs, landscaping and other suggestions in a photographic way, reinforcing some ideas also suggested by city planners.
"I just thought it was a great starting point, or a little beyond the starting point," Grigg added, adding he made a few notes on what Brooks said about city park facilities.
Moses Lake Chamber of Commerce President Jacie Dasc-hel called Thursday's meeting "a great first step," in a process to hook a lure to Moses Lake. Daschel also echoed Brooks, saying beautification sells, and there are several little things the community can do to add plants and other pieces of the puzzle to help beautify the area.
That focus could be one thing, and then the golf and the lake and the other activities are ones Brooks said will keep them entertained while in Moses Lake. The best way to brand yourself is to select just one aspect of a city to focus on and build around it.
"What's your focus?" he asked. "Narrow your focus so you're known for something in you're downtown."
He said most towns have a lake, and the majority of western counties promote outdoor recreation. Western Washington tourists will go to Cle Elum for sunshine before Moses Lake, and will drive to Lake Coeur d'Alene before taking a dip in Moses Lake.
The city of Leavenworth, like every other example Brooks cited, began from the ground up with one business taking on a Bavarian theme. Brooks stressed the change has to begin at the grass roots level, rather than from the city. But he said the key is getting the millions of people in western Washington to come to Moses Lake.
"You do have a great community, with tremendous potential. And nothing sells like water," Brooks said. "But you have to have the lure to get you there."
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