Overgrazing may harm snowpack

SILVERTON - Are cattle grazing in Arizona causing snow near Silverton, Crested Butte and Aspen to melt more rapidly during spring? That interesting line of conjecture was submitted at a recent meeting of geographers held in Denver.

Everybody who skis the backcountry or who has dug a "hasty pit" to study the stability of a snowpack has seen layers of dust left by winter storms. The dust can look like the layers of frosting in a cake.

Thomas Painter, a research scientist at the National Snow and Ice Data Center, said that as the snow melts, the exposed dust layer forms a dark surface crust, somewhat like a dirty roadside snowbank. This crust soaks up nearly twice as much sunlight as uncontaminated snow.

Computer models predict the dirty snow melts 18 days earlier than white snow, although that has not yet been proven, a scientist told the Rocky Mountain News.

Six of seven dust storms in the San Juans and Elk Mountains studied by Painter's team were traced to northeastern Arizona, mainly to grazing lands on the Navajo Reservation. Painter blames cattle grazing. He further points to sediment from the bottom of mountain lakes in Southwestern Colorado that indicate the red desert dust began flowing into Colorado 150 years ago. Cattle began proliferating in the Four Corners region about the same time, he said.

Or did they? Sheep are more common than cattle, and in any event, livestock grazing probably did not begin until somewhat later. However, a regional event called the Little Ice Age, which was at time of wetter and colder weather, ended about 150 years ago.

But why does any of this matter? Well, if temperatures warm in the West, conditions may become drier. If they are drier, that means more dust - and more dust means snow disappears more rapidly in the San Juans.

If snow disappears more rapidly, then the bare ground will soak up and absorb heat more readily, further increasing the temperature - and in turn affecting local vegetation, from trees to alpine wildflowers.

Ski towns growing gray hair

STEAMBOAT SPRINGS - The graying of ski towns across the West would be a surprise only to Rip Van Winkle. Through the 1990s, the biggest jump in proportionate population growth rates in Breckenridge, Vail and many other places was in the 60-plus age bracket. Younger people were still more common, but they ceased being the overwhelming majority.

Now, in the new century, the bulge is becoming even more conspicuous as baby boomers within ski towns get ever more gray hair while baby boomers from elsewhere begin to retire to ski towns. This trend is being noted in Steamboat Springs, where the retirement-age population is increasing at a rate six times the national average.

Meanwhile, the population of Gen Xers is not growing nearly as fast, and, in fact, might be declining. For a number of years, school enrollment in Steamboat Springs and even its bedroom communities has been lagging. While there was a slight growth this year in one of the bedroom areas, near Oak Creek and Yampa, the same general trend holds true. Gen Xers from many ski towns seemed to have moved to the cities rather than endure the great expense of raising families in an expensive resort environment.

Steamboat Springs continues to grapple with the implications of these demographic wrinkles. A city planner, Tom Leeson, told The Steamboat Pilot that a task force on growth is looking at the rate of growth, why it is occurring, whether it is a problem and what tools the community is using or can use to help manage it.

In looking at the graying of Steamboat, the local task force wonders whether one consequence will be a less vibrant community. Don't get the wrong idea here - gray-haired people in ski towns are by no means somnambulant sorts. Leisure for many is 100 days of skiing each winter, not a rocking chair. But, for the most part, they are having a good time, not engaged in running a community.

In Steamboat, answers are not yet clear, but the task force is reported to be considering what can be done to encourage a more year-round employment base, to retain younger, child-bearing people.

Vail affordable housing sells out

EDWARDS - Yet more evidence has arrived that the delivery of hundreds of new, lower-end housing units in the Eagle Valley is being sopped up by a hot and hungry demand.

All but a handful of the 282 townhomes, condominiums and single-family homes that are being erected at the Miller Ranch, a project in Edwards, 10 miles west of Vail, have been sold. This comes a year earlier than had been expected, reports the Vail Daily.

After the terrorist attacks on Manhattan and Washington D.C. in 2001, construction of speculative second-home mansions ground to a halt in the Eagle Valley. Instead, several major lower-income projects were begun in Vail, Avon, Edwards and Eagle. Those construction starts were accompanied in some cases by warnings of an affordable housing glut.

The units, which range from $130,000 to $240,000, will not be completed until next year. Eagle County government is the co-developer.

The homes are restricted to those working full time in Eagle County or who earn at least 75 percent of their income from Eagle County businesses. As well, buyers must live there full time. Appreciation is capped at 6 percent per year.

Round knobs tougher for bears

SNOWMASS VILLAGE - With last year's bear encounters still fresh in mind, newspapers in resort communities across the West have been carrying stories about bears now emerging from hibernation.

Avon, located west of Vail, beefed up its regulations over the winter after local police were dispatched 70 times for bruin-people interactions. While nothing much came of these interactions, the potential is always there for lethal consequences, both to bears and to people.

This new law aims to make Avon less interesting to hungry bears. Aping what Vail, Aspen and other communities did long ago, Avon now requires residents and second-home owners to keep their trash inside until the day it is to be picked up.

As well, residents of a trailer community in Avon are to get bear-proof containers. Actually, bear-resistant might be the better description. "If it's a determined 600-pound bear, it could still be a problem," explained Jeremy Frees, operations manager for the company Waste Management. The $250 containers have locking lids and are made of heavy-duty plastic, he explained.

Whether plastic containers are enough remains to be seen. Aspen and Snowmass have been at this much longer, and last year wildlife officers felt it necessary to kill a dozen bears that had gotten into trash, homes and businesses.

Wildlife officers are urging homeowners to think of bears when they buy doors and door handles. Bears can easily figure out how to open doors with flat handles, but can't get their paws around round handles.

A-Basin aims for 'bigger & better'

SUMMIT COUNTY - While business has been flat at many ski areas across North America, it continues to grow in places close to major metropolitan areas such as Denver. Among those ski areas in this new wave of growth is Arapahoe Basin.

Ironically, while Arapahoe Basin is among Colorado's oldest ski areas, it stagnated for several decades. New owners have installed a snowmaking system and also partnered with Vail Resorts in season passes. As a result, skier days have grown to 300,000 annually during the last three years.

"We're already extreme busy right now, and it's projected to get even busier," said Alan Henceroth, director of mountain operations. "You hear a lot of talk about how flat the ski industry is, but that is not true here."

The Summit Daily news explains that A-Basin wants to build a mid-mountain restaurant and also expand into an adjacent, mostly above-timberline area called Montezuma Bowl. While A-Basin currently has 490 skiable acres, the expansion would yield another 300 to 400. It would be used from mid-January through May.

Henceroth said the expansion would serve as a "bigger and better" marketing tool to help boost skier numbers further. Like other resorts located along Colorado's Front Range, A-Basin hopes to capitalize on the demographic bulge of the echo boom generation, which is now in its early 20s. As well, the urban corridor along the Front Range is expected to add more than 1 million new residents in the next two decades.

Jackson Hole remains wealthiest

JACKSON HOLE, Wyo. - Mirror, mirror, on the ski world wall, which is the most filthy rich resort of all?

Examining IRS records for 2003, Jonathon Schechter reports Wyoming's Teton County, which is essentially Jackson Hole, slipped to No. 2 in per capita, although it remains the richest of the resort counties of the West.

"Despite images and reputation, by every measure Teton County is more wealthy than any other resort community, including Aspen, Vail, Sun Valley and Telluride," he writes in the Jackson Hole News & Guide.

Teton County had led the nation for many years, probably owing to the fact that Wyoming does not have an income tax, causing many second-home owners to declare their vacation homes as their primary residences. Teton County's mean adjusted gross income per return was nearly $94,000, behind only that of Fairfield, Conn., which is essentially a suburb of Wall Street. Of the top 20 counties for income, only Teton and New Mexico's Las Alamos County are not near a metropolitan area.

Another way of looking at wealth is the number of exemptions per income tax return. By that measure, Pitkin County, where Aspen and Snowmass Village are located, is tops - or rather, lowest - in the nation, although Colorado's Summit, San Miguel and Gunnison counties make the top 20, as does Teton. So does Denver and Washington D.C., for that matter.

Cash infused into the Butte

CRESTED BUTTE - Thanks to the deep pockets of Tim and Diane Mueller, who purchased Crested Butte ski area a year ago, $57 million in upgrades are planned for this summer.

Snowmaking will be expanded, the ski school will get better facilities, and a quad is to replace T-bar lift. As well, three snowcats are being purchased to help reinforce Crested Butte's marketing claim of having Colorado's best corduroy.

One of the biggest goals is to make the ski area more kid-friendly, with the philosophy that if kids like Crested Butte, the parents will also come - and return again. Crested Butte has a low retention rate. To get those kids and keep their parents, Crested Butte is working on creating a kids' map of the ski area that will include kid-only trails, fun zones and club houses.

Aspen heads for real estate record

ASPEN - Real estate sales during the first three months of 2005 suggest the Aspen market could be headed toward yet another record this year. Sales during the first quarter hit $430 million, an increase of 33 percent over sales at the same time last year. Sales last year topped $1.6 billion.

Citing a Land Title Guarantee Co. study, The Aspen Times reports that this year's strong performance was not skewed by a few huge sales. In fact, the number of transactions is significantly higher than last year.

- compiled by Allen Best