Mountain Town News
Crested Butte bookings up 60%
CRESTED BUTTE, Colo. – Snow, it’s a wonderful problem to have in Crested Butte. In less than two weeks, more than seven feet of snow fell on the ski area there. Down in the two towns at the base, Mt. Crested Butte and Crested Butte, the snowfalls during that same span measured 51 and 40 inches respectively.
Nobody’s complaining, though. Erika Mueller, spokeswoman for the ski area, said “It’s much more exciting to market snow, and we’ve been given ample opportunities to measure the snow in feet instead of inches.”
Mueller told the Crested Butte News that February bookings increased 60 percent compared to the same week last year. While the destination business – people flying in on jets – has been declining for years, the snow is stimulating the “drive markets.”
The Crested Butte News observes that the drive-market dines on hamburgers, the destination folks on prime rib. They stay longer and spend more. But Crested Butte is happy to sell hamburgers after two lean winters.
Telluridians love TED
TELLURIDE, Colo. – No matter how much powder has been deposited on the slopes of Telluride on March 16, some people intend to have their tushes parked in the comfortable seats of the local high school auditorium.
There, thanks to a local couple, the TEDX talk being held in Vancouver, B.C., will be broadcast. Speaking will be theoretical physicist Allan Adams, geneticist Wendy Chung, and cartoonist Randall Munroe, among a dozen or so others.
The Telluride Daily Planet says that Katrine and Bill Formby previously brought the first broadcasts of Ted to Telluride in 2012 and 2013. “It’s one of the most fulfilling things I do all year,” Katrine Formby told the newspaper.
Such talks, she added, are best experienced with other people. “I get more out of TED when I watch it with other people,” she said. “I want to be able to walk out of a session and talk to people about what we just saw.”
The TED talks, all four days of them, will also be broadcast live in Whistler for those able to peel out $3,750 for registration.
Old railroad route still closed
WINTER PARK, Colo. – Will four-wheel enthusiasts ever again be able to traverse the Continental Divide of Colorado between Rollinsville, in the foothills above Denver and Boulder, and the ski town of Winter Park on the west side?
The apex of the route is 11,676-foot Rollins Pass, and just east of it is the Needles Eye tunnel built for a railroad intended to go from Denver to Salt Lake City. The tunnel was used from 1904 until 1928, when the 6.2-mile-long Moffat Tunnel opened at a much lower elevation.
The Needle’s Eye tunnel was closed by a rockfall in 1990, and Boulder County has never seen fit to clear the tunnel of debris. How come?
Reporting on a recent meeting, the Boulder Daily Camera reports the cost of repairing decaying trestles and other work at $10.5 million.
An even larger concern appears to be impacts to adjoining tracts of public land now designated as wilderness by the U.S. Congress. Boulder County Commissioner Elise Jones is among those worrying that allowing four-wheelers that much access will tempt them to go places they shouldn’t.
Edward Wiegand says cost shouldn’t be prohibitive. He says the route can be reopened by hewing to an older wagon road.
“This area is owned by the citizenry, and to keep it closed because one county wants to make some kind of environmentalist statement is just not fair to the entire public, not just motorized recreationalists.”
Firefighting v. snowmaking
JACKSON, Wyo. – Why create a small pond atop Snow King Mountain, the ski area whose base is six blocks from downtown Jackson?
Mayor Mark Barron maintains that the $1.2 million expense is needed to provide firefighters with water in case of adjoining forest fires, such as occurred two years ago. He concedes the reservoir could be used for snowmaking for the ski area, but insists that’s just a secondary consideration.
But Councilman Jim Stanford sees flipped justifications. “It doesn’t seem like anybody in the firefighting community is calling for a pond to be built” on top of Snow King, he told the Jackson Hole News&Guide. “Certainly the biggest beneficiary would be Snow King’s snowmaking.”
