Avon, CO – The Beaver Creek Property Owners Association (BCPOA) and the Greystone Condominium Association have filed a lawsuit against Vail Resorts to prevent the construction of what the plaintiffs have termed an “amusement park complex” planned for the mountain atop the Colorado ski area’s Buckaroo Express Gondola, facing Beaver Creek Village and within close proximity to residential neighborhoods.
“We believe an amusement park complex is not appropriate for a setting like Beaver Creek, where the rides will permanently scar the face of the mountain and alter the character and beauty of this valley for both residents and visitors,” said Tim Maher, President of the BCPOA board of directors, which represents 715 property owners at the Colorado ski resort. “The amusement park rides would be a distance of less than two football fields from the closest homes and well within sight and earshot of many homeowners’ bedroom windows.”
The new activities and amenities proposed by Beaver Creek owner Vail Resorts (VR) include a mountain coaster to be operated year-round, a ropes challenge course/zip line, a summer tubing hill and an operations building to support the half mile-long steel track coaster. The BCPOA feels that in addition to marring the mountain view from homes in the valley, the proximity of the mountain coaster to homes would generate year-round noise given its capacity of accommodating up to 500 riders per hour.
“Most people would agree an amusement park is not a good fit and very off-brand for Beaver Creek, which Vail Resorts markets as a premiere, world-class resort,” said Barry Parker, Vice President of the BCPOA Board. “The roller coaster proposed at Beaver Creek would be the only installation of its kind this close to residential areas in any U.S. mountain resort. The vast majority of coasters in the U.S. are installed at amusement parks or water parks, not luxury resorts.”
Beaver Creek is a luxury ski resort with luxury homes, where the median home price is $4.3 million. A similar lawsuit by homeowners in 2007 prompted Vail Resorts to hold off on plans to build an alpine slide at Beaver Creek. The lawsuit filed to stop the alpine slide had been on hold in District Court with the agreement of all parties since the project was abandoned. By the recent court action, the property owners have reactivated that litigation and added new complaints. The current Vail Resorts plan moves the mountain coaster farther from residents’ homes.
“We understand that there has been a reactivation of a previous lawsuit which in our opinion is not relevant. We disagree with their allegations and will vigorously defend our position,” said said Doug Lovell, vice president and COO of Beaver Creek Resort. “After spending so much time with property owners to respond to their concerns expressed in 2006 – including close to 10 meetings since February of this year – we are very surprised and disappointed that they are reactivating their lawsuit because our dramatically revised plans are responsive, terrific, and will engage a broader group of kids from different income and diverse backgrounds at our premier resort and in the outdoors as only we know how to do.”
The BCPOA’s Maher disagrees.
“We want to work amicably with Vail Resorts; however, our environmental, visual, noise and economic concerns have been repeatedly ignored,” Maher said. “Vail Resorts is not living up to their own stated values of being aligned with communities and the natural environment. Conversations between the BCPOA board and Vail Resorts led to no resolution of the issue.”
The BCPOA’s choice of the term “amusement park” is not accidental, as the 2011 amendment to the National Forest Ski Area Permit Act of 1986, known as the Ski Area Recreational Opportunity Enhancement Act (SAROEA), expressly forbids construction of amusement parks at ski resorts that operate on National Forest lands, although it does specifically single out mountain coasters and zip lines as the type of activities that can be permitted. The BCPOA offered its support for the passage of the SAROEA in the hope that it would help Vail Resorts put their proposed alpine slide on Forest Service land, out of sight and sound of Beaver Creek homes.
The Vail Resorts plan for Beaver Creek, however, calls for construction to take place entirely on private land owned by VR.
Mountain coasters, which originated in Europe, already exist at other U.S. ski resorts. Snowbird in Utah, which operates on a patchwork of Forest Service and private land, completed one just this summer, complementing a similar facility opened several years ago at neighboring Park City Mountain Resort. Vail Resorts already operates one at its Breckenridge ski resort in Colorado. In the East, there are mountain coasters operating at Wisp Resort in western Maryland, Camelback in Pennsylvania, Jiminy Peak in Massachusetts, Okemo in Vermont, and Attitash in New Hampshire, among other places.
Beaver Creek officials gave a tour of the proposed site to members of the media on Thursday, where work to develop the summer tubing operation already got underway last week. “These new activities will engage kids and allow us to educate them about the mountain environment and ecosystem through play and fun,” said Lovell. “Beaver Creek has a 30-plus year track record of industry leading guest service and doing so in a way that always delivers on our brand promise. The new activities followed a very public process and will absolutely live up to all of those ideals.”
The BCPOA’s complaints over Vail Resorts’ plans aren’t limited to noise and viewscapes. “Based on our review of the plans, construction of an amusement park complex at Beaver Creek would also result in significant environmental damage, including the removal of 350 mature aspen trees for the roller coaster alone,” added Parker.
Vail Resorts’ landscape plan calls for replacing those trees with 92 significantly smaller trees, the BCPOA contends. “This environmental damage is a direct contradiction to Vail Resorts’ stated core philosophy that their resorts operate in some of the world’s greatest natural environments, and they are compelled to care for and preserve them,” said Parker.
Vail Resorts counters that their Beaver Creek mountain coaster, dubbed the Forest Flyer, will actually passed through gladed terrain.
“We have spent nearly eight years carefully crafting a plan to best respond to the concerns expressed by homeowners in 2006-2007 around the location and impacts of an alpine slide with a dramatically different plan,” Lovell said. “We abandoned the proposed alpine slide and the Haymeadow location entirely by moving up and out of this area with three different recreational activities (a summer tubing hill, a ropes challenge course, and a Forest Flyer) in the area of the Ranch and up to Allie’s Cabin. This is the right location because the activities, all determined to be uses by right on our private property by Eagle County, can be effectively and efficiently accessed via existing infrastructure, the Buckaroo Express Gondola and the existing Ranch building.
“The location out of and above the Haymeadow, as well as the Flyer apparatus versus an alpine slide, also mitigate prior concerns around sight lines and noise,” Lovell added. “There have always been people against new innovations at ski resorts and we do have guests and homeowners who would like us to eliminate snowboarding or terrain parks at Beaver Creek – seeing those activities as ‘not appropriate’ or ‘unbecoming.’ Ultimately, we believe that all our mountains, including Beaver Creek, should have a wide variety of activities year-round, that make them accessible to the widest number and types of guests – not just to a select few. We would imagine that the Beaver Creek homeowners have a high respect for property rights and are disappointed that some have chosen to not respect ours in this situation.”
The 50-foot tall high ropes challenge course would be built directly over a wetland area and stream that feeds into the Eagle and Colorado Rivers, the BCPOA alleges. Vail Resorts has not yet obtained permits from the Environmental Protection Agency to construct the facility. Colorado Open Lands, a private, non-profit land conservation and land trust organization, holds the conservation easement for the land on which Vail Resorts plans to build the ropes course.
“Building an amusement park is incongruent with this organization’s mission of open space preservation,” said Parker.
The last opportunity for the BCPOA to administratively protest the plan was unsuccessful when the Beaver Creek Design Review board approved Vail Resorts’ plan in a 3-2 vote on August 21. The BCPOA and Greystone thereafter jointly filed the lawsuit in the Eagle County District Court that contends that Vail Resorts has not honored prior agreements made with the BCPOA and 11 homeowners associations in Beaver Creek, is violating government regulations (including those pertaining to wetlands), and is also in violation of its own governing documents for Beaver Creek. Additionally, property owners are contending that because of close proximity to homes, the new activities will be a nuisance to neighbors. The lawsuit also alleges that Vail Resorts has misrepresented/concealed its plans from neighbors, has instigated civil conspiracy and violated the Colorado Consumer Protection Act.
“The neighbors are distrustful of Vail Resorts, a corporation that has a pattern of deception with us,” Parker said. “When Vail Resorts built the Children’s Ski School and the Buckaroo Express Gondola for improved access, the BCPOA was very supportive, with certain restrictions on summertime operation of the Gondola, which operates very close to a number of private residences.
“Thereafter, unbeknownst to the community, a food service entity of VR acquired a liquor license for the Children’s Ski School by identifying it in the application only as ‘The Ranch.’ Earlier this year an application was submitted to the county to amend that license allowing a very large expansion of the Children’s Ski School deck. This prompted neighbors to ask, ‘Why does a children’s ski school need a liquor license?’ It’s all part of their plan to sell alcohol to amusement park complex guests – a master plan that Vail Resorts has never shared with their neighbors,” Parker concluded.
“This is a classic case of David vs. Goliath – we are fighting the most powerful and influential corporation in Eagle County,” added Maher. “They are a billion-dollar company; we are private homeowners having to fight this with our own personal money – but we are committed to doing it because we want to protect the beauty and character of Beaver Creek and the natural environment.”