Saturday, October 15, 2011

Exhibit Three: The VWC: Salesmanship Trumps Meteorology ~ Larry Calloway

The following is an unauthorized condensation,
actually just selective quoting from Larry Calloway's December 2006 article: "The Village At Wolf Creek: Salesmanship Trumps Meteorology" in The Rockies
I recommend the entire article:

The Village At Wolf Creek: Salesmanship Trumps Meteorology
About that snow removal complexity. . .

Larry Calloway ~ December 13, 2006 ~ The Rockies
~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

¶ one:
“What falls on Wolf Creek Ski Area falls on Alberta Park. The Texans who dreamed up The Village at Wolf Creek don’t seem to understand that. Their urban-density land development at 10,300 feet elevation will get 40 to 50 feet of snow a year. The Forest Service environmental impact statement acknowledges “snow removal complexity” as one of the access problems. {...}”



¶ two:
“There are many other problems, technical and moral, with concentrating 2200 houses and 222,000 square feet of commercial space on 287 acres of near alpine terrain that used to be part of Rio Grande National Forest.{...}The rationale, presumably among the things under study by U.S. District Judge John Kane, is you can’t mess with a man’s private property even if the public has a fundamental interest in it.”

¶ three:
“Maybe a snow removal complexity narration will give the picture of just one of the problems with this bold triumph of salesmanship over urban planning, geology, meteorology and environmental protection. {...}”

{An Epic Story (and object lesson) of the Wolf Creek Ski Area’s missing porta-potty }

¶ seven:
This is the snow that Bush billionaire buddy B. J. “Red” McCombs, owner of 1200 Clear Channel radio stations among other things, and his developer, don’t seem to understand. {...}”

¶ eight:
“Take a look at the snow removal complexity math. {...} Even if the property owners association limited the size of dwellings to, say, 1800-square-foot town houses, the average snow depth on an occupied lot would be just under 11 feet. And this calculation doesn’t account for snow from the plowed roads.{...}”

¶ nine:
The snowfall in the southern San Juans has been ignored before, with disastrous consequences. At the Summitville open pit mine, 16 map miles down the Continental Divide from Wolf Creek {...}"

¶ ten:
“But they under-designed and rushed construction and cut corners, according to court testimony. Then came a heavy winter. Imagine snow piled in a bathtub two feet above the rim. At a an average room temperature it drains as fast as it melts. Now, pile the snow to five feet. The leach pad at Summitville overflowed. Toxic water spilled. All the fish disappeared from the Alamosa River in the San Luis Valley. The international mining company declared bankruptcy. The U.S. government declared Summittville a Superfund site. Millions of dollars have been spent, but people along the Alamosa River still have to monitor their wells for cyanide."


read the full article here

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