Crested Butte is buzzing with new resort and condo projects

Crested Butte is retooling its image and finding a new market for development, which is coming at a fast pace in this formerly sleepy ski resort.

By Pete Lewis

Photo by James Ray Spahn, CrazyHorse Productions

Crested Butte is undergoing a major development boom, sparked by the 2004 purchase of the ski mountain by Twin Peaks Development.

Twin Peaks, a privately held company owned by Tim and Dianne Mueller, specializes in rejuvenating tired resort communities. The company also owns Catamount in Steamboat Springs.

But Crested Butte has remained one of the Rocky Mountains' last sleepy ski towns for good reason. At 9,300 ft above sea level, winters are long, cold and snowy-perfect for a ski resort but problematic for development.

Nestled in a box canyon, the town and ski resort are also accessible by only one road.
Even in the best weather, the town is a 30-minute drive north of Gunnison, three hours from Grand Junction and more than four hours from Denver. Transporting construction materials and workers into Crested Butte, then storing and housing them once they arrive, is problematic at best.

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WestWall Lodge
Crested Butte's construction boom officially started in July 2004 when Denver's Haselden Construction broke ground on WestWall Lodge, a 170,000-sq-ft condominium project at the base of the ski mountain. The complex was completed in July 2006 for an approximate construction cost of $32 million.

WestWall was a long time coming.

Eagle Resort Development originally retained Avon-based architects Zehren and Associates and Haselden to develop the 4.3-acre site in the late 1990s. The project was shelved after Sept. 11 when the market for luxury resort condos tanked along with the rest of the economy. When ownership of the ski resort changed hands, interest picked up and sales soared. By the end of 2004, 90 percent of the units had been presold.

WestWall consists of three buildings that wrap around three sides of the new WestWall ski lift. The complex includes 44 ski-in/ski-out luxury condominiums and 20,000 sq ft of ground-level parking. Heavy timbers were used on the exteriors to create a rustic, old mining town appearance.

Monroe & Newell Engineers Inc. was the structural engineer for the project, with Beaudin Ganze Consulting Engineers providing mechanical, electrical and technology engineering, and Buckhorn Geotech handling site and soil investigation, geotechnical engineering and construction materials testing.

The location and nature of the site presented several construction challenges, said Neil Sharpells, Haselden construction executive. During the short summer, materials could be stored nearby in parking lots designated for skiers, but throughout most of construction, storage was at a premium.

"We are about three miles from town up a steep hill," Sharpells said. "Just getting materials and workers to the work area during the winter was sometimes a problem."

Construction proceeded through two of Crested Butte's toughest winters. In January 2005, 136 in. of snow fell. One storm dumped eight ft of new snow in three days. The winter of 2006 set a record for the most days below minus-20 degrees, and it wasn't uncommon for nighttime temperatures to drop to minus 40.

"Some days the snow was above the tops of our trailers," said Vice President of Preconstruction Byron Haselden. "We never missed a day of work, but the joke was that you show up for work and, no matter what your job, you were handed a snow shovel."

When not combating snow and frigid temperatures, Haselden had to deal with runoff from the ski mountain.

"Ground-water control was a big issue," Sharpells said. "During winter, it's a frozen tundra, then around May 1 everything starts to melt and you have two months of mud."

For drainage and dewatering, Haselden dug 18- to 20-ft, gravel-filled ditches up slope from the project.

Lodge at Mountaineer Square
In April 2005, Crested Butte Mountain Resort, the company the Muellers created to develop and operate Mount Crested Butte, began construction on first phase of Mountaineer Square, a master-planned ski village at the base of the ski mountain.

The 257,000-sq-ft development consists of two buildings, one five story and one six story, that contain 95 condominiums, a 65,000-sq-ft parking garage, 40,000 sq ft of commercial space and a 17,000-sq-ft conference center.

Bull Stockwell Allen, BSA Architects of San Francisco designed the complex. Dasse Design Inc., also of San Francisco, is the structural engineer. Beaudin Ganze Consulting Engineers provided mechanical engineering. Manchester, N.H.-based Stibler Associates did the interior design and space planning. Haselden is the general contractor.

Construction is about 60 percent complete, scheduled for a July finish. Michael Kraatz, vice president of real estate development for Crested Butte Mountain Resort, said some units will be ready for occupancy by April.

As with the WestWall project, the nature of the site presented several challenges. The site is bordered on two sides by roads and two by existing buildings, so space was at a premium. Sharpells said they worked with essentially a zero lot line and little space to store materials.

"In many ways, this is like doing downtown urban construction but in a remote location," Kraatz said.

Red Lady Lodge
This spring construction will begin the first major project on the ski mountain itself, Red Lady Lodge.

The 17,000-sq-ft project will be accessed by a gondola and include a 250-seat dining area, another 90-seat fine-dining restaurant, a "kids zone" for youth activities such as movies, and a planned tubing hill. Since construction will be limited during the ski season, completion is set for either Thanksgiving 2007 or 2008.

Gary Hartman of Sunlit Architecture said the building stresses energy efficiency and environmental responsibility.

"We're using energy-efficient materials and a lot of reclaimed materials from the buildings that were on the site to keep with the old mining town theme, " Hartman said. "We're incorporating water-efficient technology and photovoltaic electricity, and we'll purchase wind power-generated electricity."

While the general contractor has not been named, Monroe & Newell is the structural engineer and Beaudin Ganze Consulting Engineers is the mechanical engineer.

Labor in Short Supply
While Crested Butte is a great place to play, everyone agrees that attracting qualified workers and housing them is a major complication. Sharpells estimated that only five percent of his workers are local.

"We've had a presence in Gunnison and Crested Butte since the 1990s," Haselden said. "We built a school in Crested Butte and in Gunnison, so we have good relationships with a lot of quality subcontractors. We've also negotiated deals for a lot of housing for our employees and also for our subs. It's gotten to the point that local real estate people sometimes call us for leads on available housing."

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