Half-buried trailers are trash to some, but creator
calls it art
AIRSTREAM RANCH
What: Airstream Ranch.
Where: Access at Bates RV, 4656 McIntosh Road, Dover
(Exit 14 on Interstate 4).
Contact: (888) 228-3778 or
fbates7@comcast.net.
By GARY WHITE
THE LEDGER
DOVER -- If you have driven on Interstate 4 between
Plant City and Tampa recently, you have probably
noticed them. Eight silver travel trailers tilt
eastward at a roughly 20-degree angle, wheel sides
forward, looking a bit like dominoes caught in
freeze-frame just as they begin to topple.
Their wrinkled aluminum skins reflect the sunlight,
even on a recent overcast afternoon, creating a
diversion that is almost impossible to ignore among
billboards and traffic signs along a typically
charmless stretch of highway 11 miles west of the Polk
County line.
Its creator has dubbed it Airstream Ranch, an homage
to both Texas' Cadillac Ranch and a popular brand of
trailers he happens to sell at his nearby recreational
vehicle dealership.
"People get a big kick out of it," said Frank Bates,
owner of Bates RV and the designer of Airstream Ranch,
which occupies a grassy plot a quarter-mile west of
his dealership fronting I-4's eastbound lanes. "They
drive by and see it and enjoy it. It's something to
look at."
While Bates calls it art, Hillsborough County
officials offer a less romantic description -- code
violation -- and they want it removed. The county has
scheduled a hearing on the matter next Friday, and
signs at the Bates RV dealership reading "Save
Airstream Ranch" direct customers to petitions
supporting the assemblage as "a historic Florida
roadside attraction." Bates said about 3,000 people
have signed the petitions.
Bates envisioned Airstream Ranch last year, as
Airstream Inc. was celebrating its 75th year. A Texas
native, Bates had long admired Cadillac Ranch, an
outdoor display of 10 partially buried Cadillacs in
Amarillo, Texas, devised by businessman Stanley Marsh
III and erected by the art collective The Ant Farm in
1974.
Though Bates originally wanted to install shiny,
pristine Airstreams, as 2007 wound down he bought six
trailers from a junkyard to go with two he already
owned. In early January, workers using a backhoe and a
large crane spent two days burying the trailers nose
first, 6 to 8 feet deep. By the time the third
Airstream was planted, three news helicopters had
arrived to get aerial footage.
Bates, 52, had hoped to include an Airstream from each
decade of the company's existence. He settled for
trailers dating from 1957 through 1994 and ranging
from 16 feet to 34 feet.
Photographers from across the country have swooped in
to capture Airstream Ranch on film or in pixels. Bates
invites visitors to stop at his dealership, where
employees can shuttle them by golf cart to the site,
rather than stopping along I-4 to take pictures.
"My one mistake is I made sure all the good sides were
facing the road," Bates said. "The problem is the sun
shines from the south, so the photographers always
want to take pictures from the south side and always
take pictures of the bad side, which I feel terrible
about."
As Bates recently gave a reporter a tour, a car
arrived from the south, taking advantage of an open
gate, and a couple approached the trailers on foot,
bearing cameras.
Gene Toole, an Ohioan spending the winter at a nearby
mobile home park, said he wanted a photo for a friend
who has an Airstream.
"I think it's unique," Toole said of Airstream Ranch.
"I know there's an issue with some neighbors. Most
people I've talked to are kind of positive about it."
Word of Airstream Ranch recently reached Marsh through
a reporter from the Amarillo Globe-News.
"I said, 'Imitation is the sincerest form of
flattery,'" Marsh said in a telephone interview. "I
don't own the idea of 10 tilted poles. I hope your
area and your artists have as much fun with it as I
have had with mine. If I were in your neighborhood,
I'd go look at it."
If Airstream Ranch is allowed to remain, Bates said he
would like to replace some of the dented trailers with
better preserved models. Bates envisions creating a
park and playing host to art shows and even weddings.
But the future of Airstream Ranch is in serious doubt.
Ed Brill, Hillsborough County's manager of code
enforcement, said Bates' violations include improper
off-site advertising and misuse of agricultural land.
Bates denied the advertising charge, noting the
display contains no signs.
Hillsborough's code-enforcement board, a group of
seven citizens, will consider the case at next
Friday's hearing in Tampa. Brill's department will
present its side, Bates will be invited to respond and
citizens also will be allowed to speak. If the board
sides with the code-enforcement department, Brill said
Bates will be given some time to remove the trailers
before he starts incurring fines.
Bates argues that Airstream Ranch is a work of art,
and in the lobby of his dealership he displays a
letter from Alan Moore, an art professor at the
University of South Florida, supporting that
assertion.
Marsh, told of the controversy, instantly sided with
Bates, whom he does not know.
"I think the First Amendment gives us complete freedom
of expression and is more important than any zoning or
local officials," Marsh said.
Bates does not make such high-flown arguments; he just
wants to keep his vertical trailer park.
"Everyone in Texas knows Stanley Marsh III because he
did Cadillac Ranch," Bates said. "Well, it would be
kind of neat in 30 or 40 years if everyone knew Frank
Bates because he did Airstream Ranch."
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