By MARTA HEPLER DRAHOS
TRAVERSE CITY -- Move over New York City.
Traverse City is getting its own New Year's Eve street celebration -- with a countdown ball to match.
The countdown to 2010 will take place Thursday on the 200 block of East Front Street with live music, a charity drive and the first Cherry-T Ball Drop. Only instead of a crystal ball dropped from the top of a skyscraper, the event will feature Traverse City's favorite fruit dropped from a 228-foot construction crane.
"We went on the hunt to find a 6-foot-diameter cherry because I said anybody can drop a ball," said developer Thom Darga, whose DargaWorks crane will be used to lower the cherry -- a giant inflatable globe dressed up to look like the fruit -- to the ground as the clock strikes midnight.
The event is being organized by a group of business friends as a way to draw people downtown on New Year's Eve while doing something good for the community, said Brian Sweebe, co-founder of the online entertainment guide NorthernSpin.com and a manager at the downtown restaurant Red Ginger. It was inspired by New York's annual Times Square celebration and by the crane that is being used to construct 101 North Park, a mixed use condominium project at the corner of Front and Park Streets.
"I've always been intrigued by the ball dropping in New York, and downtown has grown so much that we can do something like this," said Sweebe, who hopes to make the celebration an annual event.
Admission is free but revelers are being asked to bring non-perishable food and personal hygiene items for Goodwill Industries of Northern Michigan. Agency volunteers will accept the donations in a large tent that will be outfitted with heat lamps to double as a warming area.
"We're going to ring in the new year... with hope," said Ruth Blick, director of marketing and fund development for Goodwill, whose homeless shelter averages about 80 people a night. "There's such a huge need right now for basic needs that every little bit counts."
The 200 block of Front will be closed beginning at 6 p.m. and parking at the deck on State Street will be free all night. Entertainment leading up to the countdown includes ice carving demonstrations by NMC culinary arts instructor Bob Rodriguez from 8-10 p.m. and acoustic music by Jason and Nick from 10:30 p.m. to midnight on a stage near the crosswalk at Horizon Books. The State Theatre will show the movie musical "Grease" at 9:45 p.m. at regular prices.
The event could be a boon for downtown restaurants and stores such as Horizon, which will be open at least until midnight, said Sales Manager Amy Reynolds. The bookstore will host music by the folk group Photographers from 8:30-10:30 p.m. in its Horizon Shine Cafe.
Espresso bar Cuppa Joe inside the bookstore also will be open until midnight to serve hot and cold drinks, said Sandi Daley, owner of the coffee bar chain.
"We definitely will be open and staffed and ready to rock, because I have a feeling we're going to be busy," Daley said.
But the big attraction will be the drop of the cherry ball, a red-colored Zorb "water walking ball" ordered from China. The ball will be lowered slowly from its "stem" at a height of about 100 feet beginning at 10:30 p.m. Sweebe said organizers are looking at ways to illuminate the ball as it descends, "so it's a giant lit cherry in the sky."
Keeping the ball inflated in the cold winter air could prove problematic, said Darga.
"This could be a dried cherry ball drop if we're not careful," he said.
Sweebe expects the celebration to attract about 2,000 and said he has already had 1,200 hits on the Web site www.cherrytballdrop.com. The event has a budget of about $5,000 donated by business and community sponsors, and one business has volunteered its rooftop as a site for a permanently fixed crane that could lower ball the ball in following years.
"We're trying to instill a notion that if you can have fun and do something good for the community at the same time it might be self-sustaining," said Darga. "We want this to be an ongoing thing, not just one year."
Family-friendly New Year's Eve street parties are popular in many cities including Macon, Ga., which bills itself as the "cherry blossom capital" and counts down each year by dropping a cherry blossom ball. In Gatlinburg, Tenn., where Traverse City Community Development Director Bryan Crough spends the holiday, an estimated 40,000 turn out to welcome the new year with a street party featuring music and fireworks.
"It's a real good draw in Gatlinburg, so I think it'll be a real good draw here," Crough said.
