WILMINGTON — For the past 30 years Wilmington has been a one-horse town when it comes to carriage tours in Downtown. But now after years without competition, the city is considering some changes to how permits are issued. Those changes would potentially allow for a new company to start offering tours.
The issue first came to the attention of City Council last year when Wilmington resident Sarah Grugen was told she would not be able to apply for a permit to operate her own tours since one company holds all of the current permits issued by the city.
Last week during City Council’s agenda briefing, City Attorney Meredith Everhart presented council with potential direction the city can take.
Under current city code horse drawn carriages are considered vehicles for hire and the city only allows five permits for this use, Everhart said. The first permit was issued about 30 years ago; since then the same company has acquired all five.
Even though the company holds all five permits, the owner has told city staff that no more than three carriages operate at any one time.
Grugen originally asked the city to consider increasing the number of permits from five to seven, since she had two of her own carriages she would like to operate.
Current assessment
The city code when it comes to horse drawn carriages is fairly vague and lacks any provisions regarding animal safety and sanitation.
Areas in which Everhart feels the city code is deficient include: safety equipment on carriages and horses, temperature limits for operation, training for horses and operators, and waste bag requirements.
Regardless of whether the council decides to allow new permits to be issued, Everhart said she recommends addressing the above issues to bring the city up to speed with comparable cities.
Traffic concerns are another area Everhart said she believes needs to be addressed, specifically when it comes to operating more than one vehicle at a time.
Not just for businesses
Aside from the horse tours in Wilmington, the Wilmington Police Department has a mounted unit that operates downtown, but the city code is also deficient when it comes to police units as well. The mounted unit will typically deploy at the 2nd Street Parking Deck, but there are no facilities in the city that offer water or shelter for them.
“Once they are deployed, until they rerun back to wherever they are, they have no way (to get) water or shelter … They are constantly coming on and off patrol because there are no facilities downtown,” Everhart said.
One of the final issues Everhart wants the city to address is the consideration of adding a proper carriage stand definition in city code, and the current use of a city right of way without proper designation. The current tour operator in Wilmington operates out city right of way.
“I’m sure that most of you are aware of where the current carriage business is set up. That actually is not a formally designated place … that’s a two-way traffic location, a traffic turnaround between two medians,” Everhart said.
If the city is to allow the current tour company to continue to operate out of the current location, she said it is necessary to change to code to designate the area as an official loading zone.
The medallion system
The City of Charleston’s current system was used for comparisons, and according to Everhart, staff is recommending the adoption of a medallion system, similar to that in Charleston.
- The number of medallions would be set at six, as approved by city traffic engineering. That would allow a maximum number of six vehicles to operate at one time.
- Number of permits would go from five to unlimited; companies could have as many vehicles as they wanted as long as they are insured and inspected.
- The maximum number of medallions issued to one company would be three.
- Medallions would be awarded on a first-come first-served basis.
- The current operator would be given the first three medallions, which is the maximum number of vehicles he claims he uses at one time.
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