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Show Sat/Sun/Mon/Tues, September 1-4, 2018 Continued from A-23 Mountain Town places where nature, and not the built environment, dazzles at every turn. The environmental footprint of mountain town residents, however, is just as big, if not even bigger, than their city cousins. If not everybody understands this, Crested Butte’s Mark Reaman does. “As green as we like to believe we are, we choose to live in a harsh winter environment that depends primarily on fossil fuels to stay warm, run the ski lifts and get people and food here. None of that is helpful to the environment or the long-term future of the planet,” Reaman wrote in a July op-ed edition of the Crested Butte News, which he edits. “But we are human and we all (myself included) want the freedom of our cars, warmth in the winter, food on the table, the lifts to run and the tourists to come and spend their money so we can live here.” Can Crested Butte more effectively put its words into action? Reaman noted two disjointed but related items on the town council agenda. First was a study of greenhouse gas emissions triggered by the town and its resort economy’s demand for goods and services. Later was a discussion about adding refrigeration to the big outdoor ice rink on the outskirts of the downtown area. “As a hockey parent, I like the idea of consistent ice, by the way. But to discuss ways to cut electricity use in Crested Butte and two minutes later talk about refrigeration without at least noting some of the irony was a missed opportunity,” he wrote. “Crested Butte won’t save the world by banning cars or not allowing refrigerated ice. But every little bit helps,” he adds. The baseline inventory shows that electrical generation was responsible for 48 percent of the community’s carbon dioxide emissions. Much of the demand was caused by buildings. A recent report to city officials points the finger toward improved building designs, to enhance efficiency. Confederate leader’s name on highway quietly excised LORDSBURG, N.M – It’s been 153 years since Appomattox, the official end of the Civil War. We’re still tidying up the history, as is evident in a story out of New Mexico. The Santa Fe New Mexican reports that state highway officials have removed the last of the highway markers along Interstate 10 that honored Jefferson Davis, the president of the confederacy. This all began in about 1910 and 1920 when people were getting cars and starting to use them. In turn, adventurers began linking together local roads into what they called highways. The Lincoln Highway —mostly dirt paths until after World War I — eventually became what is today I-80. The Park Record The United Daughters of the Confederacy had in mind something similar, with a transcontinental highway from Virginia to California traversing the southern states. Davis’s name has become part of the landscape across the South and, for a time, even in New Mexico, says the New Mexican. But New Mexico has tended to celebrate the Union’s leaders. But during the Civil War, it was also site of a significant battle. Confederate forces from Texas sought to make New Mexico a part of the confederacy. There is also some conjecture that they hoped to wrestle control of the new gold fields around Breckenridge and other mining camps for the Confederate treasury. The Confederate soldiers were scuttled in the Battle of La Glorieta Pass, near Santa Fe, by a militia that had journeyed south from Denver and was aided by Union loyalists in the Santa Fe area. The New Mexico Department of Transportation said the Jefferson Davis Highway designation was never official. In fact, the same stretches of interstate are known as the Purple Heart Memorial Highway. Critics, notes the New Mexican, have argued such memorials are part of an effort to recast the story of the Civil War and downplay the role of Confederate leaders in maintaining the institution of slavery. Commercial jets fly into Telluride’s airport again TELLURIDE, Colo. – Several years ago, the federal government provided much of the $50-million plus needed to make the mesa-top airport just outside Telluride a little more usable. It is being used, if mostly by private jets. Still, there has been some commercial service. The latest operator is Boutique Air, an affiliate of United Airlines, which began twice-daily service to Denver this week. This allows the airport to make the claim of being the highest in the United States with scheduled commercial service. The elevation is 9,078 feet. The Telluride Daily Planet says that about 3 percent of the resort’s visitors arrive via the small, expensive and very local airport. The vast majority who fly arrive via the airport at Montrose, about an hour away by mostly two-lane highways. Visiting cop let off for pulling gun on teenager JACKSON, Wyo. – A law officer vacationing in Jackson Hole will not be prosecuted for pulling a gun and detaining an innocent teenager. The special prosecutor ruled that the police officer from Colorado will not be prosecuted because she “lacked criminal intent or evil mind” when she heard a loud noise, saw an open window in a house, and assumed a teenager who was running had committed a felony. The teenager was in fact running to catch a bus. Witnesses said she ordered the teenager to the ground in a prone position and threatened to shoot. The Jackson police chief said that the visiting cop had crossed the line, as she had no authority in his jurisdiction. A-25 Submit event recaps, photos and news arts@parkrecord.com You set the scene |