Tama-wreck
March 28th, 2009Posted in Skiing in Luxo-land
One of my hobbyhorses on this blog is to criticize the trend in the ski world to cater to the wealthier skiers, either by selling them special privileges to ski the powder before everyone else, providing them with special on mountain clubs on public land, designing lodges and restaurants so immense and opulent that we all end up paying more for lift tickets and lunches to pay them off, and of course, the resorts built just for the wealthy.
I therefore highly recommend a reading of Lee M. Spencer’s Guest Commentary on the New West Blog; Lessons from Tamarack Resort. Mr. West was a ski patroller at the recently closed Tamarack Resort. He has penned a very thoughtful look at the high end resort founded on flawed premises. I appreciate his willingness to see what killed Tamarack is not just applicable to ski resorts, but to the communities we all live in as well.
I even learned a new term “neoliberalism”! It seems like a term that suffers from semantic gymnastics since policies espoused by its adherents seem run contrary to what many people think of when they think of the policies of political liberals. I was reassured to learn that an op-ed columnist (Stanley Fish) at the famously liberal (or so we’re told) New York Times was also hazy about the meaning of the neoliberalism term. To better understand the opposing natures of the two uses of “liberal” I found this site helpful.
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Lee M. Spencer commented:
Thanks for your support, and all your work on behalf of skiing.
SkiGreenGuy commented:
Yes, thanks for the great site and articles that support the spirit of skiing! Besides, where else does one get references to Stanley Fish and powder skiing on the same blog?
It’s my hope that the current economic downturn puts the ski industry’s real estate-driven financial model into question. There are other ways to make the business work, like by catering to locals. See this link for more http://skigreenguide.com/?p=750
snowman commented:
Thanks for your supportive comments guys! I think there are a lot more people (skiers) discontent with the big money, big development, skiing as a mere amenity approach that has ruled the ski industry for the past couple of decades. A story on the radio yesterday caused me to wander a bit off the reservation in today’s post (http://www.powderblog.com/skiing/2009/04/23/flint-michigan) on Flint, Michigan’s efforts to recovery from being tied to the success and failures of a single industry.
I look forward to reading more by each of you!