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Ronnie Polaneczky: Ducks on the Schuylkill: Public getting goosed?

Why is Ride the Ducks, whose operations were suspended after the fatal crash, already advertising a new tour to launch from the Schuylkill? A city decision might not come for weeks. And I've been wading through a thicket of e-mails between Ride the Ducks representatives and lobbyists, the IVCC and city officials. They appear to show the city's enthusiastic support for Ride the Ducks while being dismissive of its competitors.

Despite lack of a city OK, this flyer says that the Ducks will quack on the Schuylkill.
Despite lack of a city OK, this flyer says that the Ducks will quack on the Schuylkill.Read more

THERE I WAS on Tuesday, poking around the American Bus Association's trade show at the Convention Center, when I spied a rack of materials promoting Philly's visitor attractions.

Displayed amidst the brochures and pamphlets was a glossy, blue-and-green flyer. Its banner read, "Inter-Quacktive fun for Groups of all Ages!"

I figured that the flyer belonged to Ride the Ducks, since anything in this city containing the word "quack" is often associated with the amphibious-tour company.

What I never expected was that the two-sided sheet would breathlessly promote Ride the Duck's "City and Schuylkill River Adventure."

Wait . . . what?

Schuylkill?

Everyone knows that Ride the Ducks, whose Delaware River operations were suspended after last July's fatal crash, wants to shift operations to the Schuylkill.

But public response has not been enthusiastic, especially among users of lovely Schuylkill River Park.

The addition of garish, quacking, diesel-stinking boats to the western waters could heavily impact the park - a skinny slice of riverfront that has been transformed from a scary wasteland to an urban Eden.

Ride the Ducks submitted its Schuylkill proposal to the city managing-director's office last month, and a panel of reviewers is mulling it as we speak. A decision may not come for weeks, city officials tell me.

Yet, Ride the Ducks' flyer is advertising a Schuylkill tour right now, as though the company has already gotten the green light.

The water tour "is on a portion of the Schuylkill River that is free of large commercial traffic," the flyer explained, an apparent acknowledgement that last summer's crash was with a barge. Passengers, it also noted, could "use the famous Wacky Quackers" and "quack along with the captain and the music."

What the duck?

"No, this isn't a done deal," said Ride the Ducks vice president Bob Salmon, when I asked if, indeed, this was a done deal. "We're still waiting for the city's response to our proposal."

(Deputy Managing Director Brian Abernathy said the same thing. He added that he was "surprised" that Ride the Ducks is advertising a Schuylkill tour).

Salmon said that his company's representatives attend annual trade shows, like the American Bus Association's, to promote duck rides to tour operators.

These operators, he says, tend to book events one to two years down the road. So anyone reviewing the Ducks flyer would likely be thinking in terms of tours in 2012 or even 2013.

By then, he hopes, a Schuylkill operation would be up and running. So, the materials reflect his dream for the future, not the current reality.

(Except that the company website, which markets to the public, not to tour operators, also is pushing the Schuylkill tour.)

"Our hope is that we get approval," Salmon said. "If not, then we obviously would go back to the tour operators and change our plans."

As for this summer, he says, "We intend to operate in Philly in 2011. We are just waiting to learn when and where."


 
If Salmon sounds confident of getting what he wants, well, why wouldn't he?

Almost from the day it opened here in 2003, Ride the Ducks has enjoyed special treatment from both the city and from the Independence Visitor Center Corporation, when it comes to competing for tourist dollars.

For years, I've written in this column about the company's mysterious clout. Ride the Ducks uses a slippery legal technicality to garner huge visibility for itself outside the IVCC. It has brokered big visibility indoors, too.

But the city and the IVCC have ignored complaints from small operators who've asked for a level playing field, as per National Park Service concessions laws.

I've been wading through a thicket of e-mails between Ride the Ducks representatives and lobbyists, the IVCC and city officials. They appear to show the city's enthusiastic support for Ride the Ducks while being dismissive of its competitors.

(I'll share highlights in a future column, once I've read through all thousand e-mails.)

Even now, the race to accommodate Ride the Ducks is bizarre. From the city's initial announcement in October (sans public input) that the Ducks would move to the Schuylkill, to its eventual request for a proposal that is basically tailored for the Ducks - well, you've gotta wonder what's going on.

You could argue that the city is just trying to keep a Philadelphia business afloat, a good thing. But I suspect that argument is not all it's quacked up to be.

If a troubling situation looks like a duck and acts like a duck, it just might be a duck.

E-mail polaner@phillynews.com or call 215-854-2217. For recent columns:

http://go.philly.com/polaneczky. Read Ronnie's blog at http://go.philly.com/ronnieblog.