Man’s Maps Draw Tourists To Downtown

Ya got trouble, right here in the Lake City, with a capital T and that rhymes with D and that stands for downtown.

Doug Merrick spotted one culprit months ago, but kept it to himself until Coeur d’Alene decided to pay someone $45,000 to heal its downtown.

“Another government study. I’ve heard that same line so many times,” he says. “Free enterprise can do a better job.”

Doug speaks from selfish interests, but he’s no flimflam man. He’s a 38-year-old businessman who’s stuck a catheter into the heart of Coeur d’Alene tourism and withdrawn some revealing information.

“We assume people driving by on I-90 know there’s a lake here, but we don’t tell them,” he says. “So they keep going.”

Doug makes maps and distributes them free to tourists. Years of waiting tables downtown taught him what tourists want to know. They ask where to get haircuts or buy local products. They want to know where to dance and watch movies.

He includes businesses on his detailed, color maps for $40 a year. That money also pays for a three-line description on another page. Doug’s divided his maps into categories: restaurants, antiques, golf courses, clothing and jewelry, churches and sports.

At first, he left his maps only at visitors’ centers. This summer, he expanded his distribution to a few Coeur d’Alene motels. He charts which maps and how many disappear from each location and chats with tourists on his biweekly distribution rounds.

He’s found that people in city motels grab his maps by the hundreds. But, in the first nine days of August, only 83 downtown Coeur d’Alene maps left the visitors’ center at Huetter. During the summer, 1,000 people stop there daily.

Doug says people who stop at the centers typically are on their way to national parks. He theorizes that they show no interest in downtown Coeur d’Alene, even just for lunch, because Coeur d’Alene doesn’t promote its assets from the freeway.

“We know the lake’s beautiful and Tubbs Hill is great,” he says. “But we have to tell the people on the freeway.”

Doug figures city officials can talk to tourists as easily as he can.

“Ask them what they think,” he says. “Find out what people are looking for.”

And spend the $45,000 helping them find it - downtown.

Book ‘em

Post Falls’ Chris Greenfield knows how to launch a campaign. She’s not running for anything, but she wants to sell Post Falls on a bigger, better library.

So she’s inviting everyone to Go-Kart Family Fun to play all day until 9 p.m. on Thursday.

Chris and other Friends of the Post Falls Library convinced Mayor Gus Johnson and Post Falls High Principal John Billetz among others to sit in a dunk tank and let people take shots at them.

They talked city administrator Jim Hammond and school superintendent Richard Harris into plunging on the bungee chair. They’ve collected dozens of restaurant passes to raffle, gifts as door prizes and hot dogs and hamburgers to barbecue.

Go-Kart will contribute 15 percent of its earnings on Thursday to the campaign for a new Post Falls library. If you want to help, then go have some fun.

See ya later

I’m losing a loyal reader this week as I leave my daughter at college out of The Spokesman-Review circulation area. I’ll need a week to mourn such a loss, so don’t look for Close to Home until Sept. 7.

, DataTimes ILLUSTRATION: Color photo

MEMO: How did you fill the gap after your children left home? Share your wisdom with Cynthia Taggart, “Close to Home,” 608 Northwest Blvd., Suite 200, Coeur d’Alene, ID, 83814; FAX to 765-7149; call 765-7128; or e-mail to cynthiat@spokesman.com.