Most Texas towns say eclipse events "exceeded their expectations"
DALLAS — The total solar eclipse in Texas might be long over, but it's still making a huge impact across North Texas. A lot of towns and places say the event "exceeded their expectations."
"Over 20,000 people checked into our welcome center. All our public parks were full," says Ashley Colunga with the City of Ennis.
Colunga said city leaders were expecting anywhere from 50,000 to 200,000 visitors to their historic town, but says expectations didn't quite meet reality, saying the clouds kept some of the crowds away.
"I do think that we saw less visitors than we anticipated, but we still had an incredible turnout. I think due to the concern over cloud coverage, a lot of the serious eclipse chasers continued going north to where they were guaranteed clear skies," Colunga adds.
Colunga says it is still too early to know exactly how many people came to the town, but says they will have those numbers by this week.
At Klyde Warren Park in Downtown Dallas, the party included live music, food trucks, and interactive science panels. President Kit Sawers says turnout was more than they anticipated, with early numbers indicating more than 30,000 people were in attendance.
"And we were told by the food trucks that they were pretty much running out of food toward the end of it! So all 25 of our trucks were hit up," Sawyers said.
Then at the Perot Museum's party, 7,000 kids and adults attended an eclipse watch party.
"It was this perfect nexus, if you will, of our mission and the planets literally aligning," Eugene McDermott Chief Executive Officer, Perot Museum of Nature and Science, Dr. Linda Silver said. "But we still had to turn many people away and we sent them either up the street to Clybourne Park, where we had our educators and astronomers also engaging people."
Regardless of expectations of turnout and economic impact, many North Texans agree, that Monday's total solar eclipse was worth the hype.
"I really think we sent these people back to their homes around the world with a great impression of Dallas we shone bright yesterday," added Sawers.
CBS News Texas asked about the economic impact on Dallas and surrounding areas but was told it was still too early to tell.
The Perot Museum is working to supply global charity organizations with unused, and gently used, eclipse glasses for the partial eclipse taking place internationally in October.