Briefs Mt. Crested Butte

D’Aquila suggests courting
hockey moms in Gunnison
Mt. Crested Butte Town Council member Danny D’Aquila listened to Gunnison Crested Butte Tourism Association director Jane Chaney’s update on the methods being used to market the area’s upcoming activities, like this month’s Gay Ski Week and the Quiznos Pro Challenge in August. Then D’Aquila suggested a new market to reach out to in the short term: hockey families traveling to Gunnison and looking to extend their stay in the valley.
He referred to the ice rink in Gunnison and the tournaments hosted there every other weekend as a “sleeping generator” that could position the Gunnison Valley as a destination with diverse offers, rather than one that offers only hockey or skiing.
“It would be nice to see us capture some of that energy,” D’Aquila, who has five kids in the hockey program, said. “If you go to Telluride they want you to stay the weekend so they’ll give you ski and stay.” He asked if there were any documented correlation between the timing of the tournaments and an increase in sales tax revenue.
The logical solution, he said, was to put together a promotion for a ski, eat and sleep package to pitch to the people traveling to the ice rink.
“I don’t believe the city [of Gunnison] has that information, but I’m sure there’s a correlation there,” Chaney agreed. She said the effort to put such a promotion together would have to start with the lodging proprietors. She said she would try to get a sense for the kind of support such a program would have.

Rogalski recommends town try for transportation grant
Vince Rogalski started helping out around Mt. Crested Butte more than 25 years ago, taking a seat on the town’s Planning Commission in 1984. On Tuesday, March 1, Rogalski, who is now chairman of the State Transportation Advisory Committee, returned to help again, offering some advice to the Town Council.
Rogalski told the council they might want to look into the available “enhancement money” as a way of improving state roads locally.
“We’ve done very well with enhancement money here,” he said. “A lot of enhancement money went into the trail that runs between the two towns and Crested Butte used about $300,000 of enhancement money to fix up their section of  [Highway] 135, from the Four-way Stop to the edge of town.”
While the enhancement money’s available from the state, it’s something the town would have to apply for, competing against other communities. Rogalski said there’s also about $5 million available for regional transit projects, and while all of the transit projects for 2011, 2012 and 2013 have already been promised funding, the money available for 2014 and beyond is still up for grabs.
“The problem is, most communities won’t apply now because there’s a match and they just don’t have the match,” he said.
“So what’s the match?” councilman Danny D’Aquila asked. “Usually 20 percent,” Rogalski replied.
In his regional transportation update, Rogalski also talked about some of the projects being planned for the Western Slope, with special attention given to state highways 50 and 92. The FASTER transportation legislation, signed into law by former Gov. Ritter, allows for as much as $700 million to be spent on improving road safety and refurbishing the state’s 126 “poor” bridges.
Two of those bridges slated for refurbishing are the twin railroad trestle-type bridges on Highway 50 in Gunnison. That work should start this summer.
Speaking to the lack of transportation-related activity in the Gunnison Valley in the coming year, Rogalski explained, “Everybody has agreed in years past that we would get Highway 135 done first. We did that. It took 15 years of planning and 10 years of construction, but we finally got a two-lane road with shoulders up here. The problem now is getting enough money to keep the surface [of 135] from falling apart.”

Town grants extension of GCEA service agreement
Town manager Joe Fitzpatrick told the council that the Town’s franchise agreement with Gunnison County Electric Association (GCEA) would expire on March 19 and that an extension was needed while he continues to work on an updated agreement.
The Franchise agreement allows GCEA  to work on town streets and property and in return the town gets perks, like street light fixtures.
“Just for ease I’ll ask for six months, but we’re working on it right now,” Fitzpatrick said.
The council agreed to the six month extension, so the town will continue to get electricity while details of the agreement are being finalized.

Transit through the trees
The success of Crested Butte Mountain Resort’s base area Adventure Park has ski area executives looking to expand their off-snow offerings. CBMR’s director of resort services Nick Herrin told the council about a staged zip line tour that’s in the works.
“The activity we got out of the base area and the Adventure Park and what it brought to the mountain village and the town of Mt. Crested Butte really caused Crested Butte Mountain Resort to look at other things we could add to it and really grow our summer,” Herrin said. “What this project turned into was something we could offer our guests year round.”
Five lines will go up around the Peachtree/Painter Boy part of the mountain, he said, possibly starting the riders off in a yurt for the feel of a guided experience. There will also be a couple of “bridge features,” where guests will have to navigate spans of wood planks of rope.
As the people progress through the course, the spans will get bigger and the features more demanding, ultimately ending the tour with a ride of as many as 380 feet. The finale will be a “leap of faith” from a platform to the ground, via mechanical belay device.
“It’s different from most zip lines,” Herrin said, talking about some of the zip line styles he’s seen, mostly in Utah and Montana. After seeing the options, resort executives settled on a canopy tour that would treat guests to “more of a guided tour.”
“We’ll talk about the surrounding mountains,” Herrin said. “We’re looking at them in this area and naming the towers, maybe, after mountains or old mining claims and really try to brand it so it fits with the history of Mt. Crested Butte and the surrounding area.”
The tour would be the only one of its kind at a Colorado ski resort, Herrin said, and executives are hoping it will extend the stay of visitors at least another day. Construction on the zip line and platforms will start May 5 with the goal of finishing by June 18, the opening day of CBMR’s summer season.
For the summer season, CBMR is looking to extend its operating hours as a way of encouraging people to stick around the base area longer.
“Because we saw the success we did with mountain biking all last year, we’re actually going to keep that Red Lady lift open all the way through Labor Day,” Herrin said. “So the Silver Queen will be open to foot passengers and the Red Lady Lift will be open to mountain biking.”
To treat mountain bikers to a couple of extra hours of ride time, the resort will run lifts until 7 p.m. during the Wednesday evening concert series on the Red Lady stage at the base area. The Red Lady lift will also run until 7 p.m. on Fridays throughout the summer season.
And for the first time, CBMR is planning to stay open for the fall leaf-peeping season, opening on the weekends to accommodate trips from the Front Range. Both chair lifts and the zip line will stay open possibly as late as the last weekend in September.
“If we see it busy enough, we’ll also have them open on the weekdays,” he said.