Gondolas and Other Important Matters

In yesterday's Weber County Forum article, we discussed an Standard-Examiner "viewpoint" piece by Weber State University President Ann Millner, addressing the ongoing gondola topic, and suggesting that any discussion of the twin gondola projects is entirely premature, inasmuch as gondola advocates have not to date presented anything resembling a coherent and detailed business plan. Like many of us, Dr. Millner has many unanswered questions, of course.

Today's Std-Ex contains what amounts to a "companion piece" to Dr. Millner's article. In today's editorial page "guest commentary," former Mecham administration assistant for special projects, Jay Hudson, takes the discussion a step further, reeling off a series of probing questions that obviously need to be asked of gondola proponents, before public decision-makers or citizens should be called upon to make any serious choices. While Mr. Hudson's queries cannot be necessarily regarded as exhaustive, I believe they illustrate the kinds of questions that are being asked by the Ogden townsfolk. These are some of the things that should be addressed by gondola proponents, in they ever get around to drafting a formal business plan.

Two other Std-Ex articles are also worthy of note, today, I believe.

In the first of these, John Wright highlights the confusion that yet persists over whether the proposed WSU-Malan's Basin gondola leg is intended to connect with the Snow Basin 2002 Olympic venue, or whether it would merely serve Chris Peterson's far more modest Malan's Basin 4-season resort. Some proponents say "yes," and some say "no," while our always-visionary Mayor Godfrey says "maybe." One thing I'll say for the Lift Ogden folks on this question -- they've consistently and scrupulously denied that Chris Peterson's Malan's Basin project is in any way connected with his father-in-law's Snow Basin plans. Of course some of them wink and nod a little bit when they tell us that in face-to-face settings, so who knows what they really believe?

And last but not least, and lest our gentle readers falsely conclude that Weber County Forum has now morphed into some strange "Gondola Forum," I'll now abruptly change the subject back to the upcoming municipal election. In this connection, please take note that the Junior League of Ogden, one of Ogden City's premiere volunteer community institutions, has scheduled a "Meet the Candidates Night," for this coming Tuesday. You can read all about it here. Tuesday night's event is a political must for all Ogden city political junkies, I think. Hopefully, concerned citizens will pack the house, and give our council candidates a good old-fashioned Ogden grilling. Some of the candidates have already come out four-square in favor of both gondola projects. Perhaps somebody in the audience will ask how they've managed to do that, in the absense of a detailed or coherent plan. Don't forget to bring your popcorn. This should be a highly-entertaining event. I've also included a link to the Std-Ex announcement in the right sidebar, within the 2005 election capsule.

So what about our gentle readers? Do any of you have thoughts or comments on any of the articles I've just linked?

And I'm going out to "play" for a little while; so feel free to use this space as an 'open thread," for anything and everything you'd like to discuss.

Comments, anyone?