Subject
Vladimir Nabokov, according to legend,
once discovered a kind of butterfly ... (fwd)
once discovered a kind of butterfly ... (fwd)
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From: Sandy P. Klein <spklein52@hotmail.com>
seattletimes.com
http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/nationworld/134635506_alta16.html
Sunday, February 16, 2003 - 12:00 a.m. Pacific
Dedicated to preserving natural wonder in Utah ski town
By Kate Zernike
The New York Times
[403070766.jpg]
[zoom_photo.gif] DOUGLAS C. PIZAC / AP
Snowboarders walk through the parking lot at Alta Ski Resort in May 1999, after
the area had closed for the season. Snowboarders are banned from the mountain
during the season.
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ALTA, Utah — He kept out the Olympics. He has kept out the snowboarders. Now, as
the world seems increasingly full of uncertainty and doom, Bill Levitt will do
his best to keep that out, too.
Levitt is the mayor of this tiny silver mining-turned-ski town — population 400,
skiing population 5,000 — which sits above Salt Lake City at the highest reaches
of Little Cottonwood Canyon, between the snowy pate of Mount Baldy and the
imposing crag of Mount Superior.
In the Salt Lake Valley, the streets are named for their distance and direction
from the Mormon temple. In Alta, the Brooklyn-born Levitt sets the compass.
Because of its elevation, Alta receives more and fluffier snow than virtually
any ski area in the country, an average annual snowfall of 500 inches. In 33
years in office, however, Levitt has preserved Alta from the commercialism of
other ski areas.
There are no high-rises and almost no condominiums. What bars there are, in five
simple lodges, close by 11 p.m.; the only noise in the starry nights comes from
the guns shooting down avalanches. When lift lines are too long, operators slow
the chairs to keep the 2,200 acres of slopes from becoming too crowded.
If all this runs counter to the economics of a faltering ski industry, it has
earned Levitt the loyalty of local residents and generations of skiers who
return to the area each year.
And lately, Levitt has been arguing that preserving Alta is not just about
making a nice place to ski. It is about saving the kind of refuge the world
could use more of.
"Let's face it, the world is going to hell in a hand basket," Levitt said,
beginning a pitch he has made often over the past year or so. "So I tell people
who come here: 'You're an Alta person now. When the world gets to be too much,
you feel like you have to flee, you just come to the bottom of the canyon. We'll
have your name on a list, we'll close the gates, we'll point the avalanche guns
down the canyon. The bad guys won't come up after you.' "
He is teasing, of course.
But it is a sign of the national mood that people who hear this believe him, or
want to. "My first thought was, 'Can our kids come?' " said Gayle Rothschild, of
Washington, D.C. With war possible, even Levitt says, "These days, I'm beginning
to wonder if I'm prophetic."
And he is not teasing about the importance of preserving this place of natural
wonder, where the writer Vladimir Nabokov, according to legend, once discovered
a kind of butterfly, where you still can spot ermine popping up from the snow.
Comfortably clear of the age to qualify for a free season ski pass, which is 80,
Levitt long has defended Alta against developers. But he began thinking about
the challenge differently after the attacks of September 2001, when a regular
guest from New York called to cancel her annual Thanksgiving stay at Alta Lodge,
which Levitt bought in 1959.
She had watched the towers collapse and could not bear to travel. She called
again, two days before the holiday, to say she had changed her mind. Arriving,
she pushed through the door of the lodge and collapsed in tears.
"That's when I started to realize, this is a haven for people," Levitt said.
"It's important for people to have a place like this. This atmosphere gives
people a chance to breathe — in their minds, not just in their chests. When you
wake up in the morning and there's fresh snow and the sun's coming out over
Superior, it just makes you want to go out and yip," he said. "How many times in
life can you do that?"
Alta opened as a ski resort in 1939. Levitt discovered it in 1954, in the way so
many other people have. Someone suggested that if he really wanted to ski, he
ski out West, and if he wanted to ski out West, the best snow was in Alta.
Early in his tenure as mayor, he persuaded voters to reject a sewer system,
which would have opened the town to development.
Before Salt Lake City could use taxpayer money bid for last winter's Olympics,
Levitt insisted they promise not to hold events in this canyon or its twin, Big
Cottonwood. He has kept the area relatively affordable — $40 a day compared with
almost double that at other resorts.
"Alta is a real local treasure, and there would be a huge uproar if it ever
moved toward the classic ski-resort development by out-of-staters," Salt Lake
City Mayor Rocky Anderson said. "We've got enough of those kind of places."
Levitt, too, has become something of a local treasure, blessed by Mormon
leaders, honored by government associations across the state. He insists he will
not step down until he spots a successor as passionate as he is about preserving
Alta. "Everyone needs to escape from something, sometime," he said. "Even I do.
But I'm a mayor."
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seattletimes.com
http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/nationworld/134635506_alta16.html
Sunday, February 16, 2003 - 12:00 a.m. Pacific
Dedicated to preserving natural wonder in Utah ski town
By Kate Zernike
The New York Times
[403070766.jpg]
[zoom_photo.gif] DOUGLAS C. PIZAC / AP
Snowboarders walk through the parking lot at Alta Ski Resort in May 1999, after
the area had closed for the season. Snowboarders are banned from the mountain
during the season.
E-mail E-mail this article
Print Print this article
Print Search web archive
0
ALTA, Utah — He kept out the Olympics. He has kept out the snowboarders. Now, as
the world seems increasingly full of uncertainty and doom, Bill Levitt will do
his best to keep that out, too.
Levitt is the mayor of this tiny silver mining-turned-ski town — population 400,
skiing population 5,000 — which sits above Salt Lake City at the highest reaches
of Little Cottonwood Canyon, between the snowy pate of Mount Baldy and the
imposing crag of Mount Superior.
In the Salt Lake Valley, the streets are named for their distance and direction
from the Mormon temple. In Alta, the Brooklyn-born Levitt sets the compass.
Because of its elevation, Alta receives more and fluffier snow than virtually
any ski area in the country, an average annual snowfall of 500 inches. In 33
years in office, however, Levitt has preserved Alta from the commercialism of
other ski areas.
There are no high-rises and almost no condominiums. What bars there are, in five
simple lodges, close by 11 p.m.; the only noise in the starry nights comes from
the guns shooting down avalanches. When lift lines are too long, operators slow
the chairs to keep the 2,200 acres of slopes from becoming too crowded.
If all this runs counter to the economics of a faltering ski industry, it has
earned Levitt the loyalty of local residents and generations of skiers who
return to the area each year.
And lately, Levitt has been arguing that preserving Alta is not just about
making a nice place to ski. It is about saving the kind of refuge the world
could use more of.
"Let's face it, the world is going to hell in a hand basket," Levitt said,
beginning a pitch he has made often over the past year or so. "So I tell people
who come here: 'You're an Alta person now. When the world gets to be too much,
you feel like you have to flee, you just come to the bottom of the canyon. We'll
have your name on a list, we'll close the gates, we'll point the avalanche guns
down the canyon. The bad guys won't come up after you.' "
He is teasing, of course.
But it is a sign of the national mood that people who hear this believe him, or
want to. "My first thought was, 'Can our kids come?' " said Gayle Rothschild, of
Washington, D.C. With war possible, even Levitt says, "These days, I'm beginning
to wonder if I'm prophetic."
And he is not teasing about the importance of preserving this place of natural
wonder, where the writer Vladimir Nabokov, according to legend, once discovered
a kind of butterfly, where you still can spot ermine popping up from the snow.
Comfortably clear of the age to qualify for a free season ski pass, which is 80,
Levitt long has defended Alta against developers. But he began thinking about
the challenge differently after the attacks of September 2001, when a regular
guest from New York called to cancel her annual Thanksgiving stay at Alta Lodge,
which Levitt bought in 1959.
She had watched the towers collapse and could not bear to travel. She called
again, two days before the holiday, to say she had changed her mind. Arriving,
she pushed through the door of the lodge and collapsed in tears.
"That's when I started to realize, this is a haven for people," Levitt said.
"It's important for people to have a place like this. This atmosphere gives
people a chance to breathe — in their minds, not just in their chests. When you
wake up in the morning and there's fresh snow and the sun's coming out over
Superior, it just makes you want to go out and yip," he said. "How many times in
life can you do that?"
Alta opened as a ski resort in 1939. Levitt discovered it in 1954, in the way so
many other people have. Someone suggested that if he really wanted to ski, he
ski out West, and if he wanted to ski out West, the best snow was in Alta.
Early in his tenure as mayor, he persuaded voters to reject a sewer system,
which would have opened the town to development.
Before Salt Lake City could use taxpayer money bid for last winter's Olympics,
Levitt insisted they promise not to hold events in this canyon or its twin, Big
Cottonwood. He has kept the area relatively affordable — $40 a day compared with
almost double that at other resorts.
"Alta is a real local treasure, and there would be a huge uproar if it ever
moved toward the classic ski-resort development by out-of-staters," Salt Lake
City Mayor Rocky Anderson said. "We've got enough of those kind of places."
Levitt, too, has become something of a local treasure, blessed by Mormon
leaders, honored by government associations across the state. He insists he will
not step down until he spots a successor as passionate as he is about preserving
Alta. "Everyone needs to escape from something, sometime," he said. "Even I do.
But I'm a mayor."
var now = new Date(); var year = now.getFullYear(); document.writeln ('
Copyright (C) ' + year + ' The Seattle Times Company');
The Seattle Times
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