The Crested Butte News Serving the Gunnison Valley since 1999
Sunday was a day…a winter day. Several inches of fresh certainly helped with appearances in a ski town and at the ski resort. It also presented a challenge for drivers. In this week’s Sheriff Stories report, my favorite day is Sunday. The local deputies started the day dealing with a ‘dog at large’ situation. From there it turned into constant vehicle mayhem as people apparently learned to drive in snow and ice for the first time this season. The report shows a steady stream of dealing with accidents, vehicle slide-offs and stuck vehicles.
I can attest to the Sunday Funday mayhem firsthand as getting from Montrose to Gunnison turned into a 7+ hour adventure and more than one trip on Highway 50 around Cimarron. Closed roads, one-lane-open roads, closed roads again, accidents, turn-arounds, hotel rooms and finally a slow late-night follow-the-plow sojourn passing a lot of cars, SUVs and semis stuck off the road. Watching unchained semis start to slide next to sweet Mercedes camper vans with summer tires was interesting near the top of Cerro and Blue Mesa Summits.
Tow truck drivers made bank. Tires, people. Good tires matter around here. You can be in a crappy low rider or a $150K Range Rover, but I’ll take the low rider with good winter tires over the sweet looking SUV with junk rubber anytime. Kudos to the overworked safety personnel.
Welcome to winter! Be prepared for it.
It’s not a done deal yet, but it appears good progress is being made to work out the fire issue at the Whetstone affordable housing project. A lack of significant water to fight a potential fire looked to shut down work on the project until next spring but that is being worked out. The county manager reports that the Crested Butte Fire Protection District has given a preliminary nod of approval for a plan that would connect pumps in the river to fire hydrants on the Whetstone site. The district is reviewing all of the specifications and engineering before giving the final go ahead. But apparently everyone is helpfully trying to solve the riddle and keep the development developing.
Winter work will keep the project ahead of schedule. The buildings seem to be going up pretty fast, and I might be the only one not offended by how they look. It is next to the Riverland Industrial Park after all. I’m glad they didn’t go up any higher, and it will definitely be dense when all the buildings are there, but it is what it is.
While the For Rent classifieds in the paper appear to be expanding of late, we’ll see what a new construction project with room for several hundred renters will do to the market. The standard mainstream talking point the last few years has claimed there is less than a 1% vacancy rate in the valley right now. My gut says that has creeped up lately. I might be raising an eyebrow if I could predict the future need for housing (I can’t), but you never know…Hmmm.
Maybe it’s just me but I’m underwhelmed as it appears many of the core business buildings in Crested Butte are going all sleek black, grey or taupe in color. Snooze me. One of the most noticeable visions of Crested Butte for decades has been the sometimes weirdly colorful appearance of the business buildings. There are still some vibrant colors out there and we haven’t turned into monochrome Seaside or Hilton Head (thank goodness) but there are fewer splashy colors than just a couple years ago. For some reason, even the primary colors on the buildings seem more muted these days. It might not matter to anyone else, but the more we change to anywhere else USA, the more we look like Anywhere else USA. I appreciated the unusual color vibrancy of the downtown landscape. I apparently just don’t understand the cool contemporary color of the moment. As one long-time business owner recently observed sarcastically — at least the town is ignoring its sign ordinance and letting some businesses get away with whatever they want so it looks like Coney Island. Ouch.
I’m not saying it will be the most epic winter ever but sometimes the slow starts turn into big finishes. Plus, I want to do my part and will this year sacrifice my season for the betterment of the general skiing CB community. In other words, I accidentally took a rock fall at Hartman’s given the late autumn biking season and will be going under the knife soon and missing the season. I will say (but had hoped to never find out) that the company handling the Vail Resorts pass refund system has been pretty good. Oh well. Doesn’t someone usually have to take a hit? I’m the guy this year…so enjoy what should be a deep January!
Happy winter everyone…
—Mark Reaman
