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Show THE ZEPHYR/DEC-JAN 2008 person, but after I die it would be nice to think I could sit and have a conversation with a fellow explorer from another century. I think we’re all explorers one way or another even if one never leaves N.Y. City . I guess what I’’m trying to say is hang on tight; change is coming and always will, your chosen path is to publish what is wrong with the system and hopefully sway popular opinion, good luck in your endeavors, me, I’’m an explorer (in my own mind), I try not to look back because it pisses me off, I’m teaching myself to look forward, your book in a way helped me deal with it. Thanks Don Edelberg SNOOKERED IN CARBONDALE Stiles : JUST THIS MORNING, I read some more pages from your tourism book. I am a slow reader, preferring to take in well-considered words one crap at a time. Deep thinking helps to aid digestion in all facets of the human operation, although any orthopedist worth his bone saw will tell a potty lingerer that it is unhealthy to read in squat for more than a chapter, depending on the tome... Today, a grimy, cold-hearted Colorado fall day, my progress (?!) in Brave New West made it to the chapter focusing on Disco Boy and the calamitous, theme park fantasyland - that has become-of Gateway, Colorado. Elk Grove, California POVERTY FLATS, UTAH - A Modest Proposal It its latest incarnation under ownership by international developer Leucadia, Inc., Cloudrock has been speaking of how it embraces “new urbanism.” This concept applies to the design of towns and cities, not to rural destination resorts. A central concept of “new urbanism” is mixing commercial and residential uses in a walkable community design, as you find in European towns. In light of the type of development proposed by Cloudrock, complete with a village/town square and its own “Cloudrock Code,” Cloudrock may well be on its way to becoming a true town. A lot us suspect that Cloudrock anticipates incorporation as a municipality when it achieves sufficient resident population to satisfy the Utah Code criteria for the minimum. If Cloudrock incorporates, then it becomes autonomous in respect to land use planning and regulations. The Village of Cloudrock could produce its own land use code that permitted any combination and density of commercial and residential it pleased, anywhere within its boundaries it desired. At the February 14 County Council hearing, a council member questioned whether the new Cloudrock development was indeed a town instead of lodge. “It has the potential to become a town.” Grice continues by saying “it’s not a retail town . .. .[w]ell, lsee coming back to you time and again making changes and sliding in that direction.” The Cloudrock development agreement makes specific (if vague) reference to “small retail”, which is not included in any version of our LUC. In addition, the application states that the accessory facilities to be located at the Wilderness Lodge will include a creek pavilion, and an event amphitheatre or conference center. Transcripts of hearings includes references to”’shops, post office, ... “ It is time to remind everyone of my modest proposal to incorporate The lands inside the Spanish Valley Water and Sewer Improvement District boundary plus Spanish Valley in San Juan County as the town of “Poverty Flats, Utah.” The developers of Cloudrock are not feeble of wit. Grice’s nose is dead on. I too predict that we will see Cloudrock come back again and again asking for small incremental changes. They may or may not already plan to incorporate as a town once the development is well underway and they have enough legal residents (registered voters) living in Cloudrock to meet state code requirements for municipal incorporation. However, if Grand County does not cooperate with granting the requested amendments to their PUD over time, it will make incorpora- tion as a town more attractive because it permits them to amend the development as they lease. , We should consider a pre-emptive strike. If we incorporate all of Spanish Valley south to Blue Hill into a municipality, then GW&SSA could become the municipal water and sewer utility and the San Juan County Commission no longer has sovereignty over land use planning and zoning within the Poverty Flats city limits. If the citizens of Poverty Flats decide to zone the areas in the San Juan County part of the city as residential only, they can do that and nobody can tell them they must do otherwise. If Cloudrock is within Poverty Flats’ municipal boundaries, then it is the Poverty Flats. Planning and Zonin Commission and City Council that make the zoning decisions concerning the Cloudrock land base. This strategy would deal with two current land use issues which are a bone of contention: (1) the development creep of Cloudrock from rural destination resort into a commercial and residential “village,” and (2) the issue of land use planning and zoning in southern Spanish Valley which is.in San Juan County, where the San Juan County Commission is seen as lusting after the tax base created by zoning large-scale commercial development. Southern Spanish Valley was known as “Poverty Flats” in the early part of the 20th century. Using the name for a town is restoration of this historic custom. Having Cloudrock and Spanish Valley located in the town of “Poverty Flats,Utah,” might not keep the rich weasels away, but it would at least select for those with a sense of humor. I have camped along the Dolores River for years, often in large, unruly groups prone to loud explosions and nudity. Twice a year, our gang of overwrought ski bums gathers on the shores of the Doloresto unwind.and take our yearly sandstorm scouring. Sometimes we float. This May, as I was getting read to shove off from the river access, I was accosted by a pith helmet wearing, bullhorn yielding Discovery Channel goonette on a golf cart. *SCREECH*SIR PLEASE DO NOT USE THE GATEWAY RESORTS RIVER ACCESS. WE HAVE A GUIDED TOUR ARRIVING ANY MINUTE, AND WE NEED THE SPACE FOR OUR BOATS. SIR, DRUG USE IS NOT PERMITTED ON GATEWAY GROUNDS...*SQUAK* I sat in awe, only slightly comforted by knowing that the nasty bug going through our camp had culminated in an impressive and turbulent power washing of the Adobe Fueling Adventure restroom facilities just minutes before. The transformation of Unaweep Canyon was complete. The fun was dead, buried under tons of kaki laundry. So what would happen after reading your chapter on hypocritical corporate environmentalism? Why I open the days paper here in the Hipster Capitol of Garfield County, Colorado, Carbondale, and see that the Colorado Supreme Court in their bid to properly poison the town water supply shot down one of our very own proud western Ranchers, the Snooks. Our story would fit right in the pages of BWN. Here, a BIKE manufacturing corpo, Garry Snook, is found to be polluting our water supply near its headwaters on Nettle Creek, from the yon reaches of his palatial mesa top estate, which borders wilderness and sits immediately above the towns water plant. When confronted by the city, who discovered that workers at Snookville had buried the creek with construction debris (three times) forcing the city to shut off its water supplies, and worse, that his workers were applying pesticides, herbicides and fertilizers to the land and that it was seeping into Nettle Creek, he does the only thing reasonable. He sues for the right to pollute our water supply to keep his (native) weeds dead and deader. A legal battle ensued for six years, and was finally resolved recently, when the Colorado Supreme Court voted 7-0 in favor of the Town of Carbondale, upholding the original ruling, made in 2003 by then 9th District Chief Judge Thomas Ossola, who had ruled Snook to be negligent in damaging the Carbondale water supply. t In our local newspaper, Snook complained: “We give money to a lot of environmental causes, including ones here in the valley... Their depiction, we believe, was unfair. Regretfully, with the court and their ruling, we won't be able to actually address the issues.” Snook, who founded Performance Bikes, a mail order bicycle company whose relentless promotions of the sport, nay the lifestyle, of mountain biking undoubtedly contributed to the mass screwing of Moab and small desert towns everywhere, now sitting on top of a (transitional) mountain town, pissing in the stream. Fitting eh? Perhaps the revised edition of Brave New West can squeeze this little ditty in someday. Corby Anderson Carbon-dale, Colorado - EMAIL YOUR FEEDBACK TO THE ZEPHYR Send your comments to The Zephyr cczephyr@frontiernet.net or write to us P.O. Box 327, Moab, UT 84532 Lance Christie Moab, Utah KZMU community radio 90.1 & 106.7 FM YOU'LL FIND ALL KINDS OF OPINIONS on KZMU WHERE AM i? YOU'RE ALL MAD < I’M RIGHT AND YOU'RE WRONG 100% wind powered ON (ey) WAS &, 5 ()) LISTEN TO US ANYWHERE ON THE WORLD WIDE WEB. ee WWW.KZMU.ORG REQUESTS: 259.5968 |
