Key city members tour Texas Panhandle’s next possible tourist attraction
AMARILLO, Texas (KFDA) - Steps are being made to open one of the Panhandle’s hidden gems to the public by key members of the community visiting the area today.
The Cross Bar Management area is a 12,000 acre special recreation outdoor facility owned by the Bureau of Land Management.
It has been difficult for the public to access the area because it is mostly surrounded by private property.
Over the last six weeks, the city came up with an easily accessible way for the public to enter the area.
Today they took steps towards gaining public support of opening it.
“The Amarillo City Council has put together a committee who’s looking at tourism and other aspects for the city and they requested the tour to look at the cross bar management area, see its property and see what could be done to actually get a public access road,” said Crystal Cowan, public affairs specialist for the Oklahoma Bureau of Land Management.
This morning’s tour hosted by the bureau of land management consisted of city council members, authors, judges and other key members of the community.
They were shown the beauty of the land as well as the things that needed to take place before opening.
That plan starts with building an accessible way of getting into the facility.
The projected entrance to the area is only a mile away from highway 287.
If the project is approved, the trestle will have to be rebuilt to allow cars to come in and out of the park.
Before the building can take place, the city must get permission from the BNSF Railway to make that trestle larger.
Then they can ask for federal money to pay for the $8,000,000 road that connects to highway 287.
If approved, it would take about six months to complete the project.
Once finished, he says the park will be a huge factor in bringing tourists to the city.
“80,000 vehicles a day are going through Amarillo on i-40 and so the job that were just trying to do is stop them,” said Howard Smith, the mayor protem city of Amarillo.
A Texas A&M Agrilife study says the area would bring $13,000,000 to the city a year.
“Hopefully we can continue to gain public support for the project and keep moving forward with having public access to the property,” said Cowan.
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