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Show Sat/Sun/MorVTues, October 22-25, 2005 The Park Record A-10 The Summit County Board of Commissioners is seeking individuals to fill vacancies on the Summit County Board of Adjustments. The Board meets the fourth Thursday of the month or on an as needed basis. Letters of interest may be addressed to Anita Lewis, P.O. Box 128, Coalville, UT 84017. For further information contact Susan Ovard at 336-3042, 615-3042 or 783-4351 ext. 3042. Deadline for receiving applications is Wednesday, October 26, 2005 at 5:00p.m. Mad Hatter Chimney Sweep Park City's Only Year Round, 11 n • T\ C • . 1 yii •. n Larry Mears State, Local & Summit County Licenses • Mad Hatteri i.- . 1.-..-.-.I c Fully Insured Call 649-7129 • Continued from A-9 Two years ago, fire roared in the region, but did not come close to the lodge. Last year, abundant rains kept the vegetation damp. But Martain Cloutier, general manager of Canadian Rocky Mountain Resorts, believes that global warming will ensure that dryness will return - exposing the forest to risk of fire. Even without global warming, the forest near the lodge is at risk, reports the Rocky Mountain Outlook. That particular type of forest has low-intensity fires every 30 years. Highintensity fires are believed to occur every 300 to 350 years. But, partly due to fire suppression for the last century, the most recent low-intensity fire occurred in 1851, while the fast high-intensity blaze was in 1652. •Is 30,000-square-foot house sustainable/ Locally Owned & Operated by \i^ Ato B? Buses cost less, environmentally friendly KETCHUM, Idaho Ketchum recently was the site of a conference devoted to maintaining sustainable communities. While sustainability has been justified for everything under the sun, in this context it was about reducing environmental impacts. After hearing former Aspenarea resident Hunter Lovins talk, one of the audience members, Steve Hogan, a restaurateur, was motivated to write an op-ed piece for the Idaho Mountain Express. Noting the construction of a 30,000-square-foot house near Ketchum this year, he said it makes "absolutely no sense that we even consider allowing these types of non-sustainable homes in our high-desert valley." He added that builders, architects, and contractors he spoke with seemed to agree in their dislike of such extravagance, but that they must listen to what their customers want. It's not just a matter of private property rights, he went on to explain, but also of public pollution. "Consider that the average home produces three times more pollution than the average car," he explained. "Now multiply that times a home that's 15 to 20 times larger than the average one." He urged Ketchum and its suburbs consider mimicking the" Green Points program adopted 15 years ago in the university ome city of Boulder, Colo. •Aspen a paradigm of cultural tourism ASPEN, Colo. - "Cultural tourism" has been a buzz phrase in Colorado tourist circles during the last couple of years. It's defined as attracting visitors to arts, festivals, and museums and the like. While this is nothing new, But proponents say that Colorado tourist towns could gain more by promoting "mind" attractions instead of just "sweat" things. One such proponent, Nancy Kramer, executive director of the Steamboat Springs Arts Council, points to Aspen as a shining star of cultural tourism. Aspen's post-war life as a resort was one equally planted in skiing and in summer festivals. Best known of the latter is the 56year-old Aspen Music Festival and School, which has $13 million budget. It adds an estimated $52 million to the local economy. Speaking at a conference reported by The Aspen Times, Kramer said Aspen enjoys an 85 percent visitor return rate and a summer demographic of visitors who are older empty-nesters. Cultural tourists have a higher income per capita than other travelers, on average spend up to 36 percent more than other travelers per visit ($623 versus $457), and stay up to 50 percent longer (more than five nights versus three nights), she explained. Creede was. also cited by Kramer. A one-time mining town snuggled in the San Juan Mountains, it has a population of only 400. But the Creede Repertory Theatre manages to support 60 artists and staff members during summer months. The Durango area is also taking preliminary steps to promote its cultural tourism, as are Steamboat Springs and other towns in northwestern Colorado. •Want adventure sport? Try riding a long-distance bus GUNNISON, Colo. - In terms of getting from point A to point B, buses cost less than any other type of fuel-burning transportation. Ditto for the environmental impact. Cars, planes - none produce less pollution, assuming average riderships. Still, few people ride buses any more, except those on the margins of society - students, the elderly, and immigrants. Greyhound increasingly confines its routes to those linking bigger cities, bypassing the more out-ofthe-way rural areas. Among those out-of-the-way rural areas is Gunnison, near Crested Butte. Lately, local transportation officials have discussed subsidizing bus operations as they already do for airlines. But it could cost $80 per passenger in subsidy, according to the estimate of Scott Truex, director of the Gunnison Valley Rural Transportation Association. The agency has $950,000 in tax revenues to spend, and it spends $750,000 in airlines. Of course, people flying from Houston to go skiing can be expected to drop a chunk of change, unlike bus riders. •Easier to move boulders than century of water law goal. Some agree that the town core would benefit from more people, while others think there are enough tourists and residents already. Beyond the goal, there is also debate about the tools whether fees should be waived. •Big promise, but at least some biomass problems GUNNISON, Colo. Mountain towns in Colorado, as well as others, have been busily trying to add to their all-around appeal - as well as their economies - by building whitewater parks that appeal to kayakers. But doing so involves more than maneuvering boulders in the creek. To ensure water remains in the creek involves lawyers, and legal maneuvering always costs money. For example, Gunnison town officials report spending $300,000 to build the park, but the legal bill has hit $500,000, says The Denver Post. Part of the reason for the high cost is that laws governing allocation of Colorado water originally did not see recreation as a beneficial use. Although they have been modified in recent decades, both farmers and cities fear the revisions will harm their interests. SUMMIT COUNTY, Colo. Interest is growing in Colorado and other states in the West about an evolving technology that converts trees and other vegetation into heat, electricity, and other useful commodities. Epidemics of bark beetles that, in Colorado, surpass even the previous epidemics of the 1970s and 1980s are spurring the interest. ' One potential biomass project is in Colorado's Summit County, where the county commissioners want to invest $2 million into a plant that will burn wood chips to county offices as well as a hospital now under construction. The goal, in addition to reducing heating costs, is to find a way to deal with the beetle-kill trees and reduce the threat of forest fires, said Steve Hill, special projects manager for .SummitCounty. "Our study showed it looked •Banff and Canmore are feasible from a technical as well as a economic viewpoint," he struggling for balance told the Vail Daily. The plant BANFF, Alberta - From would cost $2 million. Banff comes a report of rising The Vail Daily also reports tensions as a developer, Christian interest in other places. For Dubois, proposes to build an example, plans are afoot to heat array of apartments and duplexes a middle school in Leadville. It is in what is now an area of single- being talked about in Grand family homes. Dubois says he County, where the Winter Park believes his project's design and Grand Lake areas are acknowledges the existing char- among the hardest hit in acter of the neighborhood, but 60 Colorado by pine beetles. neighbors turned out to disagree However, the Summit .Daily - some of them loudly. News reports that the bio-mass The background for this story project in Nederland, located is that Banff cannot expand later- west of Boulder, is a royal bioally, as it has used up its space mess. The town's administrator, within the Banff National Park. Jim Stevens, said the town, after As such, it can expand only verti- three years, is ready to get put. cally. Plus, like all other pretty "It's the third year into this places, people want to move thing, and now, it's like, let's just there. Some 40 to 100 single-fam- cut our losses," he told the newsily homes have been razed in the paper. "We're going back to a last several years, replaced with natural gas boiler." condominiums, row houses, and The Nederland project is difother joint-walled living struc- ferent than what is being protures. posed in Summit County, both All this has some people smaller in size and, with its plan warning that the economy may to generate electricity, larger in erode, because talented man- ambition. Stevens said the elecagers may take their talents to tricity never materialized, the places where they can live in sin- heat was spotty, and as for the automation - it requires two of gle-family houses. Down-valley in Canmore is three people to tend it. presumably one of those places, In turn, plant designer Delta but there the story is of town Dynamics blames the town with officials trying to increase densi- providing wood water that is too ty along New Urbanist lines, in high in water content and for which homes are mixed with poorly maintaining the plant. shops and offices. In one area of "All of the stoppages were due Canmore, called Teepee Town, to fuel quality and maintenance the rezoning could result in 900 issues," said the firm's vice presresidents, compared to the 600 ident, Sev Bonnie. maximum permissible under existing zoning. Allen Best has edited mounIn downtown Canmore, city tain town newspapers for 20 planners propose to nudge years. 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