They cannot be built without a certain amount of transformation of the pristine mountain landscape, yet their success is dependent on the attractions of that landscape. Ski resorts have always had an equivocal relationship with the environmental protection movement. Nowhere has this relationship come under more pressure than at the US resort of Vail.
At this Colorado ski area, 'eco-terrorist' arsonists caused $12 million of damage to a mountain restaurant and ski-lifts in October 1998. They were protesting that the 885-acre 'Blue Sky Basin' expansion project would infringe on habitat for the elusive Canada lynx.
Even after the project was approved by all relevant environmental bodies last summer, there was further action on the construction access road. The Coalition to Stop Vail Expansion enlisted protesters from an activist 'training camp', run by the radical Earth First movement. Then they recruited further numbers via the internet, urging people to 'show up on July 1, and let's run this destructive corporation out of town!' On July 4, the president of Colorado Wild suspended himself from a 25ft tall tripod. And a man calling himself 'Opie' lay beneath an overturned car. Both were attempting to block the construction traffic.
Once construction got under way, a further setback occurred when the access road up the back side of the mountain was revealed to have been built across 'wetlands'; it only became evident once the road started experiencing heavy traffic. The US Army Corps of Engineers (who oversee all wetlands protection in the US), and the Environmental Protection Agency, insisted that the road be closed, leaving 1,000 truckloads of logs piled near the new ski terrain. (These will have to be brought down the main construction route on the front side of the mountain next summer, causing disruption to the mountain biking season.)
Despite all this, Blue Sky Basin's two new bowls, offering 520 acres of light, fluffy, powder snow opened on Thursday, making Vail the largest ski area in the US. The word in the valley is that most of the protesting groups have now accepted a fait accompli and won't be mounting further protests. 'We've definitely decided not to pursue anything,' Ben Doon of Ancient Forest Rescue told the Vail Daily. Only time will tell.
Meanwhile, the day-to-day business of running a ski area continues, with the season now in full swing. Minimising the environmental impact of these operations is the job of John Gitchell. Vail Resorts employ him as a full-time environmental department manager, belying their image as a 'destructive corporation'. Gitchell has been working for Vail and its associate resorts, Keystone and Breckenridge, for six years, after graduating with an MBA with specialisation in environmental policy.
'We're adopting a stronger philosophy,' he says. 'This gets into a broader issue of sustainability and recognising that worldwide impacts are going to threaten human populations in the future. Even though we're a relatively small corporation, we're starting to look at a more global scope.
'We're adopting the Natural Step, which began in Sweden, and is now a world-wide non-profit organisation whose mission is to help business become sustainable, economically, environmentally and socially. Its four aims are to eliminate waste by using renewable resources, avoiding persistent products (like CFCs and plastics), maintaining bio-diversity, and the social component - taking care of people, for example, by providing affordable housing.
'We're working on an Environmental Management System, with a systematic approach that avoids getting bogged down in details. Our goals for this season are to quantify our total solid waste, total chemical waste, and total energy use, broken down by resort and operation.
'We are now buying some wind-generated electricity, which is more expensive. Some of the Beaver Creek taxi vehicles are now using non-fossil fuels, and for the long term there are plans for a mass-transit system in the valley. With our hotels, we look at waste, recycling, energy and water usage, cleaning chemicals. In our vehicle maintenance department, we're careful about used oil and solvent disposal. Our snowmaking cannot exceed our water rights for the year, measured in acre-feet. Any streams that we take water from must maintain the stated minimum flow, expressed in cubic feet per second. The US Forestry Service, from whom we lease the land, only allow us to use snowmaking until January.'
All last season's Ski School and lift-attendant uniforms were donated to the Kosovo refugees. 'A kinder, gentler Vail' read a recent headline in the local newspaper. There's no doubt that Vail Resorts, like all other ski area opera tors, are determined to work with the environmental movement.
Future expansion plans for Breckenridge and Keystone have yet to be approved. The proposed new lifts on Breckenridge's Peak 7 are said to encroach upon the habitat of the boreal toad (the only toad that lives above 9,000ft).
Environmentalists say that Keystone's new terrain in Jones Gulch may block off a vital wildlife migration corridor.
And what of the Canada lynx, in whose name so many battles have been fought? None of the indigenous individuals have been spotted since 1973, although several pairs have recently been re-introduced to southern Colorado. Bizarrely, one of these was found dead last summer, beside the I-70 freeway near Vail, on the day before the arrested environmental protesters were due to appear in court.
