By COLE REIF
Great Bend Post
If you are driving through Great Bend during the Christmas season, it is hard to miss the city’s Trail of Lights. With light displays at Veterans Memorial Park, Brit Spaugh Park and around the Barton County Courthouse downtown, city crews start setting up the lights near the end of October.
Great Bend Community Coordinator Christina Hayes said during the 23 days that volunteers were staffed at the entrance of Brit Spaugh, there were 2,113 vehicles that drove through.
"This is only the dates we had volunteers and usually from 6 p.m. to 8 p.m.," said Hayes. "We have a ton more drivers that come through in other hours of the day."
The statistics are added up from the Saturday after Thanksgiving to Dec. 22. Last year's vehicle total was 2,227.
With the majority of the vehicles from Barton County, the second most recorded license plates came from Pawnee County. There were 17 out-of-state license plates that were tracked and one car with a Canadian plate.
The volunteers hand out promotional bags and candy canes but also collect donations to be used for light display repairs. Great Bend collected $4,952 in donations.