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Port Richey Friends Will Lower Own Lighted Ball New Year's Eve

Klint Lowry/SUNCOAST

Seaside Inn owner Don Johnson, left and his friend Markie Mark, owner of Cash Crane Rental, have teamed up to bring a touch of Times Square to Port Richey with a homemade 8-foot lighted ball they will lower in a New Year's Eve countdown.

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By KLINT LOWRY | The Suncoast News

Published: December 31, 2008

PORT RICHEY - Tonight, millions of people across the country will spend the final moments of 2008 the same way they spend the final moments of every year, staring at television screens as they watch the traditional "ball drop" in Times Square, roughly 1,000 miles away.

Two friends decided there's no reason the folks in Manhattan should have all the fun. So as midnight approaches they will debut their own version of the New Year's Eve ball for a West Pasco countdown.

"The last couple years we joked around," said Don Johnson, owner of the Seaside Inn. A few years ago, Johnson and his friend Markie Mark started talking about how they ought to make their own version of the Times Square New Years Eve Ball.

Mark is owner of Cash Crane Rental, and in their idle discussion they figured that since they had the means to hoist and lower a lighted ball, they already had the hardest part licked.

For about three years, the idea was little more than the hot air friends spew among themselves when they're hanging out. It became an annual running joke. Until this year, that is. Johnson printed up flyers announcing the Seaside Inn would feature a New Year's Eve 2009 ball drop.

"Yeah, then the joke was on me," Mark said. Now committed, the men's laughs turned to upbeat enthusiasm as they set about turning their idea into a reality.

The Times Square ball has been updated with more elaborate models several times since the tradition began in 1907. The current ball, unveiled last year, is a 12-foot geodesic sphere. Weighing nearly six tons, the balls 2,668 Waterford crystals are illuminated by 32,256 Phillips Lexeon Rebel LEDs capable of creating 16 million color combinations in billions of patterns.

Johnson and Mark's ball isn't quite that elaborate. But for a homemade project, it's impressive in its own right. Made from cold-rolled round stock steel and covered with 15 nets of multicolored Christmas lights, the ball weighs between 300 and 400 pounds, its creators estimate.

Like its distant relative in New York, the "ball" is made up of adjoining triangles in a geodesic pattern. Technically, Johnson said, it's more of an octagon than a ball.

They tried to construct the ball out of PVC tubing, but the glue wouldn't hold, and the sphere collapsed under its own weight, Johnson said. Once they accepted they would have to use welded steel, it took four men about four days to build it.

In one way, their ball exceeds the one in Times Square. The ball is suspended from a 120-foot crane.

Seaside Inn sits among a cluster of eating and drinking establishments along the banks of the Pithlachascotee River and Miller's Bayou. Mark will extend the ball out over the water. They estimate it will still be a good 100 feet in the air, compared to the 77 feet the Times Square ball drops in its one-minute descent from the top of its pole to the roof of the One Times Square building.

Mark said he plans to follow New York's lead and lower the Port Richey ball for the last minute of 2008, speeding up a bit for the final 10 seconds. When it reaches the bottom of its drop, about 10 feet or so above the water, Johnson said they will shoot off fireworks for added effect.

The ball has been suspended from Mark's crane above the Seaside Inn since a few days before Christmas, and it has generated a lot of local buzz, Johnson said. Above the tree line, it is visible to drivers along U.S. 19. Lots of people have been stopping by top ask about the ball.

With the interest their ball has already generated, enthusiasm has grown into anticipation. This year has been something of a test run, Johnson said. They are already talking about features they might add to upgrade the ball for next year and the years to come.

Drawing customers to the Seaside Inn would be nice, its owner said. What he and Mark are really hoping is that this will be the start of a local tradition.

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