Shuttles Can Get You to Parade

By The Arizona Daily Star, Tucson

Feb. 18–Sun Tran will run round-trip shuttles to the rodeo parade Thursday.

The shuttles will pick up at the Park Place and Tucson malls and deliver passengers to the Tucson Rodeo Grounds, at South Sixth Avenue and East Irvington Road, for the 82nd annual La Fiesta de los Vaqueros Parade.

The shuttle is $1 for a round-trip fare, or 50 cents for seniors or the disabled. Children 5 and younger ride for free.

The shuttles will begin service at 7 a.m. in the southeast corner of Park Place mall, just south of Park Place Drive, or at Tucson Mall, east of American Home Furnishings.

The buses will pick up passengers from the malls until 9 a.m., and will return to the parking lots after the parade.

For more information, call Sun Tran at 792-9222.

La Fiesta de los Vaqueros began in 1925, started by Leighton Kramer, a winter visitor who wanted to make Tucson an important winter rodeo center.

So many winter visitors came to Tucson to see the parade and rodeo that the city had to advertise for vacant beds. Tucson residents were asked to open their spare rooms and sleeping porches to accommodate visitors.

The parade was held Downtown and the rodeo was held on Kramer’s polo field, just north of the Arizona Inn in Midtown.

In 1991, the parade moved to Ajo Way and South Park Avenue, the same route the parade will follow Thursday. The rodeo itself has been held at the Tucson Rodeo Grounds on South Sixth Avenue almost since the beginning.

It’s been called the longest non-motorized parade in the United States.

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Copyright (c) 2007, The Arizona Daily Star, Tucson

Distributed by McClatchy-Tribune Business News.

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