We haven't found much Emerald City news to spotlight in northern Utah newspapers this morning, so we thought we'd dredge up something interesting which appeared yesterday in the Standard-Examiner. Sunday's edition contained what looked to be an out-of-context article, about a little Idaho town near the Washington state border, which has been suddenly and miraculously transformed from a chemical-plagued toxic "basket case," into a "swanky ski resort." We duly incorporate the article lead paragraphs here:
KELLOGG, Idaho — It may seem an unlikely candidate for the Pacific Northwest’s latest vacation hot spot, but this former mining town has survived decades of decline to boom once more.If the town of Kellogg Idaho seems familiar to our regular readers, it certainly should. Kellogg was also the subject of a Standard-Examiner write-up last year, when the sudden resurgence of that little "superfund cleanup site town" was mentioned, with an entirely different "catalyst" suggested. These Dave Hardman quotes from the earlier Sep 18, 2006 Ace Reporter Schwebke article (part two of a three part Std-Ex series) clearly establish that article's mendacious theme:
The once-polluted mining community — a massive Superfund site — seems to have been transformed virtually overnight into a swanky ski resort with newcomers flocking to buy condos and open businesses.
“It was a definite surprise it took off the way it did,” said Mayor Mac Pooler.
In a place where homes were selling for $30,000 five years ago, brand-new condos costing more than $800,000 are selling as fast as they go on the market. A huge indoor water park is under construction in the ski village. A destination golf course is being built.
Catalyst for much of the growth is Jeld-Wen Communities, the real estate arm of the Jeld-Wen wood products company of Klamath Falls, Ore. The company purchased the Silver Mountain ski resort in 1996 and began making plans to expand.
A key event occurred in 2004, when its first 68 condos were placed on the market and sold out immediately, some for as low as $100,000, as developers were unsure if there would be any demand. A second offering of 110 condos sold out in one day in 2005. The third and final phase of 99 condos sold out in one day late last year.
Dave Hardman, executive director of the Ogden/Weber Chamber of Commerce and one of those who made the trip, said visiting Kellogg and Telluride gave him insight into how gondolas can drive tourism and provide effective mass transit.Oh how the Std-Ex themes have changed over the last year. Whereas a gondola was the supposed economic engine that transformed Kellogg, Idaho in last year's story, the Kellogg gondola wasn't even mentioned in this year's version. Boss Godfrey, Dave Hardman and a whole claque of Emerald City gondolist lemmings were the sole quoted sources for Ace Reporter Schwebke's Landgrab/Gondola Sales Pitch last year, whereas the author of Sunday's story actually interviewed Kellogg's mayor.
“I gained the idea that gondolas were the catalyst to get people to come to the community and created a transportation system that didn’t disrupt other traffic,” he said.
The Kellogg gondola is particularly impressive because it virtually saved the town’s economy when silver-, lead- and zinc-mining operations went belly up, Hardman said.
“Even though the magnitude is much smaller than what is planned for Ogden, the gondola was a catalyst for economic opportunity,” he said.
And the Mayor of Kellogg's conclusion? A private developer bought and expanded the local ski resort, and built and marketed some Kellogg condos -- all apparently on the developer's own dime. Once again, there's no mention of a gondola as the catalyst for Kellogg's recent revival -- no mention of the city's "partnering" with the developer either. As Kellogg Mayor Mac Pooler explains it, “It was a definite surprise...”.
At this point we could carry this discussion in several directions; but here's where we're going with this (here comes the segue):
Ever since Boss Godfrey did his magnificent landgrab/gondola flip-flop in early July, it isn't merely the sale of the Mt. Ogden Golf Course that Godfrey has attempted to "take off the table." Anything and everything related to the Godfrey/Peterson Landgrab Scheme has been swept under the pre-election rug. Even the mention of the word "gondola" is verboten in our Brave New MattGodfreyWorld these days, it would seem.
And with an election looming 49 days hence, several candidates for municipal office would like the lumpencitizens to forget the two years of torment Boss Godfrey and his Gondolist fellow travellers put this community through, prior to the Godfrey's purported admission that the Landgrab Project wasn't feasible from the start. Several of Boss Godfrey's Gondolist co-conspirators are candidates for city council offices. However neither of them will even so much as mention the word "gondola." Frankly... we think they'd like the lumpencitizens to "forget the whole danged thing."
But we're not going to let that happen.
Accordingly -- and thanks to one of our gentle readers, we're able to provide our readers with a visual reminder. To the right of this column we provide a scanned version of a Lift Ogden ad, which ran in the June 12, 2006 Standard-Examiner. For a full version, without the highlighted inserts, our readers can click this link.Notable among the names of Gondolist Cult members whose names appear in this ad (which we've dubbed the "gondolist manifesto") are those of council candidates Royal Eccles and Kent Petersen. These are two rabid Gondolists who were willing to endorse a plan even before it was proposed -- a plan that indeed was never presented -- a plan that Godfrey himself later admitted to be infeasible. These are people whom, if elected, will be called upon to exercise good judgment, and to apply reason to the decisions they will make as city council members.
God help us all if either of these two "shoot-from-the-hip" nitwits are ever elevated by Emerald City voters to city council offices.
And one more thing for those trusting souls who believe (or would like to believe) that the Gondola/Landgrab Plan will REALLY be "off the table," if we're gullible enough to elect a slate of unreformed gondolists in November: We're sure the Godfreyite Pod People Ticket has a nice viaduct over in West Ogden that they'd be glad to sell you cheap.
Take it away, gentle readers.
We hope our segue didn't snap your necks.
What's on your minds, this fine Monday morning?
37 comments:
Rudi,
The enlarged version of the LO Manifesto is quite faint below the fold. Is it possible to get a better scan of that portion?
Actually, the image is taken from a digital photo. The ad was too big to fit on the scanner.
Better find your reading glasses, like your blogmeister did [wink]
We'd be happy to substitute a sharper image, if any of our readers has such an image available.
I have friends who have become rich off land deals in Kellogg over the past 10 years, I've been to the town several times, I know it pretty well. I couldn't believe Godfrey and his crony pals were making comparisons to the place last year. That was about the point in time that it became evident to me that we citizens were being duped. Glad the real story of the town finally came out in the local rag and that the forum recognized it.
Rudi:
You wrote: These are two rabid Gondolists who were willing to endorse a plan even before it was proposed -- a plan that indeed was never presented -- a plan that Godfrey himself later admitted to be infeasible. These are people whom, if elected, will be called upon to exercise good judgment, and to apply reason to the decisions they will make as city council members.
That IMHO sums up the main reason that Eccles and Peterson should not be entrusted with public office and a key role in spending the public's money. If their MO is, as it seems to be, "decision first, research later," there's no telling what harebrained money-pits they will commit the city to over the terms on the Council. At a minimum, I'd expect a Council candidate --- any one of them --- to understand that an elected public official has an ethical obligation to get the facts first, do the digging necessary to determine if a proposal is feasible, and at what cost to the taxpayers and whether it has a reasonable chance of succeeding first. Neither Peterson nor Eccles seem to understand that, based on their past performance. I've seen nothing from either [in their campaign literature] to suggest they wouldn't sign that same Lift Ogden Gondolista Manifesto again the morning after being seated on the Council.
It's retty sorry state we've come to when "research first, conclusions second" is considered a radical notion held only by "naysayers" and "opponents of progress." And yet that is precisely what Hizzonah [until very recently under pressure of losing his office], and his Lift Ogden Amen Chorus --- including Peterson and Eccles --- have been telling us for a couple of years now.
Having visited the area of Wallace/Kellogg recently and having spoken to the higher ups at the ski resort and town folks it is apparant that the gondola they built was huge for them. They built the gondola ENTIRELY ON THE CITY'S DIME years ago and it didn't do so well until they figured out how to market correctly and build things around it correctly (those were on the developers dimes). This is an argument the forum will lose because even the locals know that their town-connecting gondola helped the town immensly in the end.
Go look up Wallace Idaho and see the similarities to Ogden. Although it is on a much, much smaller scale than Ogden, it was a rough place with an Ogden-esque reputation that is now heralded for it's old-time architecture and beautiful mountain scenery. This will undoubtedly turn into a he said/she said type of argument with the tendencies of the forum, but I have spoken with the locals and resort officials and they credit the gondola and surrounding resort activities for being the catalyst that changed everything for the better.
Another reason to be suspicious of Peterson and Eccles with respect to public lands and trails is the following: On Peterson's campaign website he writes: "I have some ideas for our parks systems and some ideas for our trails system." Kent, care to clue us in as to what those ideas are?
And Mr. Eccles tells us he wants to "improve" our parks and trails. Same language Godfrey used when trying to tell us a trail through a gated community would be an improvement on what we currently have on the east side of our fair city.
a--non: I thought the Kellogg gondola was built mostly with federal money. Could be wrong--no time to look up the details now.
cato: I'd strongly encourage you and others to call Petersen and Eccles on the phone and ask them what they mean by these campaign statements. Candidates are much more open to questions from the likes of you and me during the campaign than they are after the election.
To everyone on this blog that supported me in the mayor's race. I would just like to say thank you for all the support that I received. I think that we have, through the campaign raised some issues that need to be address.
Still being a state representative I welcome you thoughts and comments both positive and negative because it helps me to be a better person and representative. So one again a big THANK YOU.
Your friend Neil Hansen
a--non:
Correct me if I'm wrong, but didn't the Kellogg gondola connect the town directly [up hill] to an established ski resort? As I recall, Kellogg did not propose a 4 mile long flatland gondola with two right angle turns in the cabeling that wouldn't connect the town with its established ski area. Which, sadly, is what the Mayor [back when he was mentioning his gondola/gondola and sell the city's parklands plan at every opportunity] was proposing that Ogden build.
I remind you that the Mayor's pipe-dream Ogden flatland gondola would connect downtown Ogden with WSU, not with Snow Basin. And only if a second privately owned and operated gondola is built to a proposed exceedingly small west-side resort [that private investors don't seem much interested in funding] is built in Malan's Basin will the Ogden gondola provide any connection at all to skiing. It's not going to Snow Basin, Ogden's well-known established Olympic venue ski resort.
Whoever built it in Kellogg, the situation the gondola fit into there is not the situation we face in Ogden, however much gondolistas want to pretend it is. And they seem to want to pretend that almost as much as they like to pretend that an Ogden gondola will carry people to Snow Basin. It won't.
I didn't say that it was an exact comparison. The bottom line in our situation is that there is not an EXACT comparison out there- so stop pretending that I pretend that there is. This is a unique proposal. But the relative comparison is there in some ways. It is just saying that something similar has been done elsewhere. Your definition of similar and mine might be different, but city gondola to resort is a shared connection.
Dan- I could be wrong, but to my knowledge, they bonded for their city gondola and the taxpayers paid for it directly. They were convinced that it would help thier city and even though they had a few bumps and bruises along the way it has helped.
a--non:
Ok, I looked it up (only took a minute using the wcforum search box):
In 1986, Congress approved a $6.1 million allocation from the U.S. Forest Service’s annual appropriation bill for the gondola, contingent on the town securing matching funds.
Two years later, more than 80 percent of Kellogg’s voters approved the $2 million bond issue, and Von Roll Inc., a Swiss gondola manufacturer, kicked in an additional $4 million for the project.
That's from Schwebke's article written almost exactly a year ago, after his visit to Kellogg.
a--non:
I didn't suggest it was an exact comparison. No two cities anywhere would provide perfect fits for anything. What I do suggest is that the situations the gondola faced in Kellogg and the one the proposed gondola faces here are not comparable. They are substantively different. That's the point, I guess, on which we disagree.
Gondolas work as means of moving people up or down significant elevations over difficult terrain. That's how the gondola works in Telluride, for example, and in other places. But I don't think anyone has yet come up with an American city where a flatland gondola, moving over city streets, has proven itself to be a cost-effective transit system or a generator of investment and development along its route. [Unlike for example proven technologies for urban transit that do have a good record as both transit systems and investment generators, like street car systems.] Happy to be corrected if I'm wrong about that.
a--non:
Besides the differences Curm mentions, keep in mind that the Kellogg gondola does not function as mass transit in any sense. The ticket price is $15 and the gondola doesn't operate during commuting hours or off-season months. What's proposed for Ogden would have to operate about 16 hours a day, 365 days a year, in order to function as promised. Nobody's ever done that as far as I'm aware. And the fare for the urban gondola is supposed to be $1.50, so fare revenue won't go far toward the $4 million annual operating cost.
Again, I'm not saying there is a direct comparison- because like you said, there is nothing like this in anywhere to compare it to- yet you all keep trying to directly compare. City gondola to resort is the comparison and it being in the west with towns of somewhat similar backgrounds in a number of ways is more of a comparison that exists anywhere else, in my mind. Obviouslly there are stark differences, but with nothing to compare to anywhere- I'll take the similarities on this one. Interestingly, the resort is doing substantially better and the condos are selling like hotcakes. They are even building an indoor water park with--- you guessed it... A Flow Rider- so there's another similarity. Finally, the gondola does operate during the off-season and quite a bid during the day. I'm not even going to make the mass transit comparison, because it simply isn't there. But again, some are- more than pretty much anywhere else that exists.
BTW Dan- have you ever ridden BRT? I have... A lot- and in my opinion it isn't even close to what Ogden needs. Streetcar- possibly but with the literally millions to tens or hundreds of millions that the taxpayers will have to come up besides the gov. subsidy, I don't think it is a good sell to Ogden either.
ENOUGH-The gondola is BS, we are not the community to house this, we are a working class town with people working at Hill and other places on a 45thou budget, stop the insanity, if you wish for this freakin gondola then come out of the woodwork and pay for it yourselves, onion lovers.
the only real comparison between Ogden and Wallace, Idaho is that they both used to have Whore houses. Period. Wallace is less than a hundredth as big as Ogden. It is only godfreyian logic that would suggest that such a slight similarity would warrant a gondola in Ogden.
a--non:
By "off season" I meant spring and fall. All gondolas that I'm aware of shut down for at least a few weeks a year for maintenance. I don't know how long the shutdown is at Kellogg.
No, I've never ridden BRT, nor have I ever ridden a streetcar! I've ridden the bus quite a bit and I've ridden a number of different light and heavy rail transit systems.
Paying for a streetcar will not be easy but it can be done. The most serious obstacle by far is the mayor of Ogden.
I don't mean to belabor a point, but others may have the same problem I had seeing all the names on the LO Manifesto.
I found a solution.
When I cut and pasted the URL into Internet Explorer, the entire list is displayed evenly and I could read names without reading glasses. However, when I was using Firefox and either clicked on the link in the WCF article or cut/pasted, the names below the fold were so light that they were illegible except for those printed in bold.
Here's the URL for anyone interested. http://wcfgoldmine.com/LOManifesto.html
To compare a generic travel story with a locally written one and trying to find a political motivation for such story is very unreasonable. In fact the shear fact that the latest story had nothing added to it too tie it back to the locally writeen story tells you how much thought didn't go into it.
And to suggest otherwise indicates how little you know about how a newspaper works.
Of course Ozboy is correct! The only comparison between Ogden and Wallace is they both used to (or still do?) have whore houses.
It suddenly dawns on me that there lies the perfect compromise to the Gondola -vs- Street car debate!
Now hear me out on this. Chicago and Ogden also both were (are) in the whore house business on a big scale. Chicago has a very successful and long lasting transit system called the "L", for elevated trains. Therefore it only makes sense that Ogden should bring the elevated gondola concept and the train idea together and build an elevated train through town! If whore houses worked in both towns why wouldn't elevated trains?
Duh:
Also, seems likely to me that the wire service Kellogg story was truncated [by the end of available space] mid-story. A not un-common happening when wire-service feature pieces are shoe-horned into available space in a local paper, I gather. The story doesn't really end. It just stops.
A local variation of the NYTimes motto: "All the news that fits, we print."
I agree, there is very little comparison between Ogden and Wallace (and Kellog). Also, if you want to compare something, look at streetcars back in the day in Ogden. Streetcars actually worked in Ogden for several decades until they were replaced by gasoline bus service (without much cause I must add). The streetcars weren’t much of a money maker themselves, but they did spur a lot of development and they moved people around. I’m not saying the streetcars would be a sterling success if implemented today, I just don’t know, but it seems like a hell of a better idea to me than the half-brained gondola crap that’s been floating around.
All I am saying is that there are comparisons. They will never be completely direct in any situation (see unique proposal)and definitely never direct enough for the over-analysis/lawyeresque points used frequently here. They are there (as well as many differences), you can choose to see them or not. Portland is a hundred times bigger than Ogden and the cheers from this blog could be heard round the city about the streetcar article from a couple of weeks ago.
Back to BRT. I lived in a city/metropolitan area that had both BRT and Commuter Rail in place and, like I said, BRT just didn't seem to be something that would fit here and be widely used. Maybe we would simply transfer the empty busses from the streets to dedicated lanes and go with that. As for the streetcar, it may just work (heck, maybe it works with a gondola), but the taxpayer dollars would be immense regardless (that conveniently is forgotten about in discussions, IMO). The one thing I have learned that this forum hates nearly as much as the mayor is government taxes and that is exactly what will happen (to the tune of millions), even if it is passed through UTA or if it is a local tax. Either that or we start selling things off to pay for it- and we know that hasn't gone too well around here, don't we?
a--non,
"The one thing I have learned that this forum hates"
"this forum" is a FORUM; it's not a person. Let's not characterize it as if it was a person. I'd like to read your input without the broad brush crap.
BTW, many of the posters on this forum don't hate taxes as you say.
I got an email from a friend in NYC today telling me she saw in the news an AP story about Ogden, Utah buying a $1,500 dollar stink meter! Boy O Boy is our boy mayor making us famous or what! We're news in New York City!!
I assured her the only foul odors in Ogden are coming from the mayor's office and that when they have the stinkmeter in city hall they have to turn it off or it will short circuit!
a-anon:
You wrote: Portland is a hundred times bigger than Ogden
Well, no. The population of Portland is 545,140. Ogden's [2005] is 79,309. If Portland was 100 times larger, it would be 7,930,900. You're off by a factor of ten and then some. It's just this kind of fast and loose with the facts that has undercut much of the LO argument to date. Portland is about 7 times larger than Ogden, and that difference needs to be factored into projections of Ogden street car usage, etc. But 100 times? No.
Speaking of bad smells coming from O town, if you folks really wanted to get rid of your mayor before January all you would have to do is sneak some odor eaters into his shoes and he would be gone by morning.
a--non:
Did you and the Geigers really think you could build a gondola!? Did you really? Are you that dumb? I suspect you are. You are the dumbest pile of shit since Lying Little Matty Gondola Godfrey. Tell the onion-reeking Geigers: THERE WILL NEVER BE A GONDOLA. EVER. IN OTOWN. EVER. And you guys are faggots.
Jason well done, there will be no gondola, and no Godfrey, praise the lord.
A sidebar to "duh" (the "nick is appropriate):
"To compare a generic travel story with a locally written one and trying to find a political motivation for such story is very unreasonable."
Unreasonable, huh? The contradictions in the two stories (regardless of the Std-Ex section appearances) was the whole point... duh. Ace reporter Schwebke took a long plane ride with a plane-load of the local gondolists and a load of pizza, and then produced a gondola sales pitch series promoting "gondolas" as the next great Emerald City economic engine. The local story is the one that's therefore questionable. Journalistically, this will be one of Ace Reporter Schwebke's worst carreer enmbarrassments.
In contrast, some neutral reporter with an AP byline published a "politically neutral" story, in which the friggin' MAYOR of Kellogg Idaho didn't even mention "the wonderfulness of gondolas."
The bias of the local reporter was the whole point. Maybe you need to go back and read our main article again. You don't seem to be very adept at reading comprehesion.
"In fact the shear [sic] fact that the latest story had nothing added to it too tie it back to the locally writeen [sic] story tells you how much thought didn't go into it."
Hey, we don't write or edit the news stories that the Standard-Examiner publishes. We just publish the current news, and sometime highlight grossly-conflicting stories.
We're going with the "neutral" one written by the guy with the AP byline, BTW.
"And to suggest otherwise indicates how little you know about how a newspaper works."
We've been publishing a successful online newspaper for almost 2-1/2 years.
How about you?
What a ridiculous and pompous ass you are!
NEXT!
It just seems very odd to me that Ogden city and John Patterson would be publicizing this oder meter thing at this time. This is very old news.
The main offender for the bad smells was the dog food company and they have fixed the problem months ago. This company also is a big employer in Ogden and has more people working for it than most, if not all, of the ski companies the city has spent so much money trying to attract.
It seems that all of the mayor's and city's efforts to position Ogden as a desirable place to visit and live could be undone by something like this odiferous publicity put out by the city and which is now being seen all over the country. Instead of thinking of us as a place one would want to visit or move to, people may very well now think of us as a place that smells bad.
Who is in charge of Publicity for Ogden?
a-non,
you keep making several empty points regarding gondolas and streetcars. All of your logic is spun to sound well thought yet dismisses or completely ignores the key criteria surrounding urban transit deployment. First of all, gondolas simply are not an urban transit conveyance. The handful of gondolas that serve transit needs are highly specific to the needs of the installation. The specific needs in Kellogg are not present in Ogden. It just plain not comparable. Just because they built a gondola there that creates a shortcut to the local ski area does not mean that simplistic view of that particular installation is the only criteria that makes it work.
Our situation is also very unique and there will is a far broader set of criteria for both the mountain gondola and the urban component than those present in Kellogg.
The construction challenges, the lack of an existing or sizable resort to justify a high capacity gondola, the financing...all were more favorable in Kellogg than here.
You sound like a reasonable guy but you exhibit a logic disconnect trying to sound fair and moderate yet still pushing the gondola line.
I'd like to elaborate more but this gondola issue has burnt up way too much of my time and the communities.
Maybe you can take on the torch and take on the challenge of finding just one single respectable ski resort professional or gondola engineer who can shed some light on our particular and unique situation. I'll listen to any expert you can find who can add to our collective knowledge. Till then you are spewing hypotheticals that have been thoroughly hashed on the pages of this blog.
Hey, a-non:
How do you like the idea of $35K gondola sponsorhips? Will you and Onion-reeking Curt Geiger and Homer Cutrubus save OTown with your $35K sponsorhipes, you douche? Speak, clown.
Anyone know how many of the names listed are people of legal voting age?
It just seems to me that a number of the names have a "90s" feel to them.
For example, we have Dakota Hyde. No guarantee it's the same person, but a quick Google search gives us a Dakota Hyde, Ogden High class of 2006.
In particular, a number of "name clusters" seem to be designed to inflate the list.
Mono
Yes, I noticed that myself, including the whole Geiger clan down to the youngest children! Actually quite typical of the whole Godfrey/Geiger approach to most everything they do. Tell a big enough lie often enough and lots of people will believe it.
Oh, and the Allen family is represented by several dubious entries including Bernard and Bernie. Hmmm, Bernie the attorney isn't trying to deceive us, is he?
Dear Mr. Curt Geiger, aka a-non and world-famous ski industry titan, captain of industry and lover of onions:
Shove your "gondola" up your nose. We ain't havin' it, and you ain't gettin' it. Alert your bosses.
Sincerely,
The people of Ogden, Utah
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