Evelyn Schlatter

The latest shot in the “what the ____ [fill in appropriate strong language as you see fit] do we do about traffic on I-70″ battles was fired when Colorado Senate Minority Leader Andy McElhaney (R-Colorado Springs) announced that he, too, was drafting a bill to address the situation.

How? By charging $5 at the Eisenhower Tunnel coming and going. The money would be used to fund still more lanes along I-70. McElhaney contends that his bill offers something “more concrete” to drivers than fellow lawmaker Senator Chris Romer (D-Denver), who’s been proposing turning I-70 into a toll-only HOV road between Floyd Hill and the Eisenhower Tunnel on Sunday afternoons throughout the year and during the winter weekend ski traffic “rush hours.” Romer’s proposed bill would also reverse a lane during peak periods to help accommodate traffic.

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Evelyn Schlatter

I was talking a few weeks ago to Robyn McCulloch, the state mining engineer of Montana, and something he said stuck with me. Since the 1980s, when “mining essentially tanked in this country,” he said, programs to learn it as a trade disappeared as well. There’s been a brain drain. In other words, most people working in mining these days are in their 40s or older because mining just doesn’t attract younger people and the ones it does attract tend to come from rural areas. They’re used to the whole idea of mining. But the problem there, McCulloch said, is that rural wages haven’t increased much over the years, so families can’t afford to send their kids to college or tech schools where they’d learn mining.

I thought about that and about changing values and expectations across different industries, and also about how new technologies are affecting industries like mining, in which fewer workers are needed to do the work. I don’t really see that many young people (read: 30 and younger) in trades like construction, plumbing, electrical work, or manufacturing. Unless you’re watching Home and Garden TV, which does feature a few beautiful, hip, young people doing things like carpentry, drywall installation, and bathroom upgrades. (See? Building things can be SEXY!) For the most part, however, what we’re talking about here is the “graying” of U.S. skilled trades. Not that there’s anything wrong with that. But if there aren’t any younger people coming up through the ranks, that means no one’s replacing retiring workers. Immigrant labor notwithstanding (and that’s a whole other discussion).

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Evelyn Schlatter

I’ve been following the I-70 mountain corridor. Not in any literal sense. I quit driving that thing around 2002 because it scared the living bejesus out of me. Yeah, I’ve used it to access Colorado’s fabulous public lands. And back in the day, to go hang out in groovy places like Idaho Springs for a nice quick getaway. But if you try to, say, leave Denver on a Friday after work…well, those of you who have braved that know whereof I speak. Brings to mind the lyrics from that Police song: “packed like lemmings into shiny metal boxes.” So I pretty much quit driving the corridor and instead, found other routes to the back country, varying my days. I do still follow the corridor, but in a more metaphysical, detached way. I’ve become an armchair observer of the discussion, debates, frustration, and freak-outs over what to do, how to do it, where to do it, and how much it’s all going to cost to decrease traffic jams on the corridor, increase safety, and make sure that everybody’s historic and environmental preservation needs are met.

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Jodi Peterson

Associate Editor

How can the West’s cities have it all? Most urban residents want open space, parks, and well-planned, contained development rather than endless land-eating sprawl. And most of us want that development to be affordable, so that we can live reasonably close to where we work.

At first glance it sounds appealing and reasonable, this vision of town life with greenbelts a-plenty and tightly-clustered, not-too-expensive homes and apartments, all surrounded by pristine open space. In places like Boulder, Colo., and Seattle, Wash., strict land-use regulations have made that vision a reality — except for the “not-too-expensive” part.
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Ray Ring

Senior Editor

David Nolt, writing for NewWest.Net, dissects a Montana development that illustrates a disturbing regionwide trend. The development is called the Ameya Preserve, and this blog has already found it irritating, here and here.

A few excerpts from Nolt:

There are many unique aspects to the proposed Ameya Preserve … but in one key respect the project is almost commonplace in the New West: it’s aimed at the ultra-rich, those who can afford to spend many millions of dollars on a second or third or fourth home.

… What the developers hope will set Ameya apart are its eco-friendliness and its emphasis on cultural amenities. Call it the thinking-man’s second-home community, or, if you’re more cynical, the liberal elite’s luxury retreat.

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With the Southwestern drought and Western growth continuing, the dry and arcane subject of water policy is suddenly … sexy. And the new new thing in Western water supply is the recycling of sewage plant effluent as drinking water.

After having effluent-recycling proposals shot down a couple of times by opponents calling them “toilet to tap” boondoggles, San Diego is once again studying effluent purification to supplement drinking water supplies, according to the brilliant online news site voiceofsandiego.org. If there’s one more winter of subnormal Sierra snowpack, it seems, San Diego will face mandatory water rationing.

And the south suburbs of Denver are looking at the possibility of cleaning wastewater sufficiently to put it into their drinking water supply. And why is that? Here’s how the Denver Post puts it:

The Water Supply Initiative estimated in 2005 that Colorado likely could add another 2.8 million people by 2030, raising the demand for water by another 202 million gallons of water a year.

The south metro region is being forced to look for new, costly water supplies. Most of the region relies on aquifers that are running dry.

A 2003 regional study by water providers found that shortages and higher costs would be commonplace for customers in as little as 20 years.

Of course, High Country News has, as usual, been an early trend-spotter on the toilet-to-tap issue, as evidenced by Peter Friederici’s sprightly and authoritative cover story on the phenomenon, “Facing the Yuck Factor.”

We here at HCN are occasionally accused of having a curmudgeonly — even doom-filled — view of things Western and environmental. The accusation doesn’t particularly rankle; this blog was named GOAT for a reason, after all.

But just to prove we can see the brighter side now and again, we now note that the City of Seattle was recently — and quite deservedly — honored as an Innovation in American Government Award winner for its “groundbreaking work in halting the impact of global warming.” The awards are given by the Ash Institute for Democratic Governance and Innovation at Harvard’s John F. Kennedy School of Government; they’re considered among the country’s most prestigious government-excellence honors.

Seattle and its mayor, Greg Nickels, were honored for a series of initiatives — from CO2 reductions at the city-owned electrical utility to government vehicle fleets that run on biodiesel to urban planning that encourages energy efficiency and reduced driving — aimed at combating climate change. According to a Harvard news release on the award, those innovations have reduced Seattle city government carbon dioxide emissions by 60 percent from 1990 levels, while fossil fuel use fell by 12 percent over a seven-year period. Those are heartening reductions that, if duplicated in cities across America and the world, would have real consequences.

And now, back to our normal programming: How likely is that kind of forward-thinking leadership in Houston, Texas?

Jonathan Thompson

Editor in Chief

It’s now official: Phoenix, Arizona, is stinkin’ hot. On Aug. 29, the mercury topped 110 degrees for the 29th day this summer, setting a new record (the reader comments on this story are especially fun). Blame global warming, if you want, but the culprit could be much more localized than that. Try pavement and concrete. As HCN pointed out here, urban environments create their own ecology, and climate. The Christian Science Monitor reiterated that fact today, with a look at “heat islands” in Phoenix. It’s been over 100 degrees in the city for 29 of the last 32 days; to get the raw data on climate in Phoenix and elsewhere, check out this groovy section of the National Weather Service site.

In totally unrelated news … Aspen, worried about the diminishing staying power of its snow, gives a lot of lip to climate change. Problem is, they have thousands of cars carrying commuters coming into town every day; hundreds of private jets landing at the airport and spewing out greenhouse gases; and dozens of ginormous, mostly unoccupied homes. And, it turns out, those empty houses — often in excess of 10,000 square feet — contribute more carbon dioxide to the atmosphere than lived-in houses, according to a Denver Post article. It’s all those pesky driveway heaters, roof snow melters, towel heaters, steam showers, humidor fans, wine cellar coolers, and other necessities that are gobbling up the megawatts and contributing to climate change.

Solution? How about opening up the Aspen wine cellars to Phoenicians who are struggling with the heat? It’s cool down there, and chances are, no one’s around to be put out by the guests.

Jonathan Thompson

Editor in Chief

Ever since the Book of Revelation (a.k.a. John’s Apocalypse), and probably long before that, humans have had their apocalyptic fantasies: The idea that we — or at least the “sinners” collapse back into the desert because of their excessive ways. (High Country News has presented such scenarios in stories by Paolo Bacigalupi and Craig Childs).

In those stories, the end comes when population growth rams up against the dry realities of the arid West. But a story in this morning’s paper made me wonder if the end won’t come not at the hands of nature, but at the hands of the banks and the economy.

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Ray Ring

Senior Editor

Carlotta Grandstaff, age 53, has scratched out a living as a local journalist for decades, based in the Bitterroot Valley south of Missoula.

She has a husband who got busted for pot (because he’s a disabled Vietnam War vet who needs medical marijuana). She’s been spotted riding a bicycle! And she has a dog named Ole Butts.

She decided to run for a seat on the Ravalli County Commission, as an independent write-in, at first. Talk about a long-shot: The county has been a conservative Republican stronghold for decades.

She based her campaign on a single issue: The county’s population has shot up since 1990, from 25,000 to more than 41,000, as subdivisions sprawl over farmland, and the Republican leadership has laid down for developers.

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Jonathan Thompson

Editor in Chief

In many of the small towns in Western Colorado, we have a favorite saying: “Whatever we do, we don’t want to become another Telluride.” What we mean by that is that we don’t want our town — be it Silverton, Lake City, Paonia or Ridgway — to become an overpriced mecca for the super wealthy that has no room for ordinary working folks.

But there’s also a tinge of envy in our voices when we deride Telluride. It’s in one of the most beautiful settings imaginable for a town, and all that wealth gives the people there the resources to protect that beauty. That’s the story, so far, in the fight to save the “Valley Floor,” a three-mile swath of pastures, wetlands and river-bottom that flanks the town’s west side. On May 9, the town announced that it had successfully raised the $50 million necessary to purchase the Valley Floor through condemnation and preserve it in perpetuity. The final $2 million came from Tom Shadyac, a Los Angeles film director, responsible for the likes of Ace Ventura and other big screen flics.

Telluride residents sang “This land is your land” to celebrate their apparent — Neal Blue, the property owner is appealing — victory in a long battle against Blue (HCN covered it here). The Valley Floor, by remaining undeveloped until now, has successfully reigned in sprawl in Telluride, and has forced development to be clustered mostly within the historic townsite. Blue has long gone back and forth with his plans to develop the land, finally leading the town to seek condemnation. The courts gave the go-ahead, setting the value of the land at $50 million. The town pitched in $25 million, with the rest coming from fund-raising efforts and donors like Shadyac.

“This is one of those incredible occasions where a small group came together” and succeeded “against all odds,” said eBay CEO and donor Meg Whitman via phone at the announcement press conference. “This really is historic; you don’t see communities come together like this that often.”

Indeed, there are some incredible stories of folks taking out second mortgages to donate and of donation cans around town stuffed with hundreds of dollars. But let’s be honest, too: Telluride is cram packed with millionaires who don’t want the views from their 10,000+ square foot homes to be spoiled by more mansions. For them to pony up this much cash is not all that remarkable.

If you want remarkable, try making an effort like this succeed in one of the less well-off communities in the region.

Paul Larmer

Publisher

On its surface, the news from the national Land Trust Alliance is amazingly good: land trusts in the U.S. have dramatically picked up the pace of private lands conservation to the point where they appear to be besting the developers. Journalist and western scholar Jon Christensen has analyzed the alliance’s latest data and concluded that private conservation efforts — primarily landowners applying tax-reducing conservation easements to their properties — now protect 2.6 million acres annually nationwide, compared to approximately 2.2 million acres that are turned into housing tracts and shopping malls. This trend is even more dramatic in the West, he says, where approximately 450,000 acres have been conserved annually in recent years, versus 330,000 acres developed. Christensen’s overview and Western state-by-state analysis can be found here on Stanford’s Center for the Study of the North American West’s web site. Jon also wrote a great overview piece for HCN of the race in the West between private land conservationists and the subdividers.

But before we get too euphoric, it’s good to recall the sobering words of environmental icon David Brower, who once said that — and I paraphrase — all conservation gains are temporary, and all losses to development permanent. The pace at which farmlands and wild lands are being converted to hardscape is quickening, as the American Farmland Trust has documented, so conservationists will have to run much faster to save the best of what’s left. And the permanence of all those “in perpetuity” conservation easements will no doubt continue to be challenged as the pressures of population growth and development mount.

Still, the gains of the rapidly growing land trust movement — as of 2005 the 1,667 land trusts had protected 37 million acres, double the amount protected just five years ago — must be applauded. With our aversion to strong land-use regulations and tepid support of public conservation expenditures, voluntary private land conservation is the biggest and brightest game in town.

Jodi Peterson

Associate Editor

As if the threatened Canada lynx didn’t face enough threats in Colorado, now a developer plans to build yet another high-altitude ski village smack dab in the middle of a migration corridor used by the shy cats.

The state’s lynx already have plenty to be afraid of — two shot dead this fall, presumably by trigger-happy hunters; two lynx tracking collars found cut off last fall, one rather pointedly dropped into a post office mailbox; and new rulings from the Forest Service and Fish and Wildlife that fail miserably in protecting the cat’s habitat.

Now Florida-based Ginn Co. wants to build condos, shopping and a ski resort not far from the glitzy sprawl of Vail (never mind that global warming promises to keep chewing up the Colorado ski season at both ends). The company plans to throw up 1700 housing units at an elevation of 10,000′ in prime lynx habitat; Fish and Wildlife is mulling a “take” permit for the company so that it can legally kill some number of cats along the way.

No doubt the new development will include a “Lynx Way” and a “Wildcat Circle.”