‘Gateway to the Grand Canyon’ Becomes Dead End : Now Off Mainstream, City Fights for Life

Tucked away amid the cool pines of northern Arizona is a city once content to rely on its majestic surroundings and a famed highway for its survival.

Today, Williams is paying the price for yesterday’s complacency. Located 59 miles south of the Grand Canyon, Williams’ identity became the “Gateway to the Grand Canyon,” which it registered as a trademark.

The city depended on tourists traveling along U.S. 66--immortalized in song and story--to keep alive the 1 1/2-mile stretch of gas stations, restaurants, hotels and curio shops that make up the city’s entire economy.

Little Effort to Expand

In the 1960s, talk of expanding the economic base was just that. No one was happy to see a railroad bypass the city, taking with it a good chunk of the population, but nothing was developed to replace it.

For two decades, Williams boomed in the summer, as thousands of cars each day streamed through the downtown business district on Route 66 bound for the Grand Canyon, and went bust in the winter.

Then came the 1980s, and the jolts that are now forcing the city, named for a tough and resilient trapper, to muster its grit if it hopes to survive. The city’s last good year was 1981, before the recession hit and tourism lagged.

Then came the blow that put Williams in the news.

Progress Brought Problems

U.S. 66, which ran from Chicago to Los Angeles, ceased to exist as a major highway with the opening of the last leg of Interstate 40, just north of Williams. Elected officials and celebrities stood along Bill Williams Avenue to hail the progress, but for many businesses, it was a death knell.

Today, abandoned gas stations and junked cars line the streets. At its summertime peak, as many as 15,000 vehicles a day made their way through town. Now, the traffic totals maybe 2,000 a day.

The main street shows no signs of the hustle and bustle of earlier days even though the tourist businesses--in various stages of disrepair--are still there. At times, one can walk the entire stretch of downtown and not see another soul.

“There are a lot of younger people demanding that we get this town going,” said Mayor Jim Hoffman, an outspoken restaurant owner.

Even most members of the Bill Williams Mountain Men--businessmen who dress in the buckskin and coonskin hats of their namesake and have marched in four presidential inauguration parades--no longer live in Williams.

‘Lots of Anxiety’

“There were tales of doom and gloom initially. Lots of anxiety and concern,” said City Manager Leon Burger.

Tax revenues dropped more than 30%, although the situation has stabilized.

But another storm is brewing that could harm what remains of the city’s fragile economic balance. The U.S. Forest Service, Williams’ largest employer, is considering closing the Kaibab National Forest’s supervisors’ office.

That could mean the loss of another 25 jobs, and in a town of just over 2,300, it would have a ripple effect.

“We’re pretty united about saving the Forest Service,” said Brandon Evans, owner of Tiffany’s Italian Shop, one of the town’s more popular restaurants and bars. “The town’s working together now, so something’s got to happen.”

Every Employee Counts

To businessmen like Evans, who depends on local residents for 90% of his business, the loss of any employee affects the economy.

“You lose a teacher, I lose my customers. You have vacant homes on the market. You lose quite a bit,” he said. “All the little things.”

The uncertainty keeps a lot pocketbooks closed, which hurts Bill Free, a Williams resident for 23 years, who owns the city’s only television and radio repair shop.

“People are unsure they’re going to have a job, so they tighten their purse strings,” said Free, 65, who has thought of leaving. “This winter was the roughest I ever had.”

But some residents, like Allan Duncan, photographer on the weekly Williams News, see the city’s problems as momentary setbacks.

Some Are Bullish

“I don’t see any problems here,” said Duncan, 26, who grew up in Williams, moved away, and then returned. “Actually this is a prosperous little town. There are always going to be people coming here.”

City officials are planning an industrial park and hope to woo a California lumber company to take over the sawmill that closed when the railroad left. There are plans to expand the local ski run.

Williams also may get a boost from a proposed scenic railroad to the Grand Canyon.