|
|
A Dose of
Pandemonium
by Ben Tiffany
The Wasatch Range has been absolutely hammered with snow this year. We
broke recodes in November, did well in December, and the rest of the
season is looking positively stormy. Little Cottonwood Canyon got a lot
of press for Mother Nature’s tantrum that yielded 100 inches in 100
hours. And the world is a-buzz with talk of the The Greatest Snow on
Earth. So mousse are double-clicking, phones are ringing, and the Utah
mountain lodges are booking reservations like mad. It will still be a
relatively slow year. But the resorts will make their payments.
Ski bums will keep their jobs. And we’ll all be pretty happy.
Like I said, it should be a relatively slow year. But, of course,
resorts have been prepared for this all along. Low pre-season snow
totals might not have helped matters much. But the terrorist attacks of
September 11th simply make skiers frightened to make any vacation plans
at all. But just as damaging to ski tourism in Utah has been the coming
of the 2002 Winter Olympics—that which was supposed to solve all of our
problems.
Sure, the resorts that are hosting Olympic events will have a banner
year. But other resorts—like those in Little and Big Cottonwood
Canyons—are burdened with the would-be visitors’ pre-conceived notion
that Utah will be absolutely choked with loud-mouthed New Yorkers and
cigarette-smoking Europeans until the end of time. Thoughtful vacation
planners have not only been wary of inflated hotel rates, and
bumper-to-bumper traffic. But they’ve also feared crowded shops,
crowded restaurants, a and the utterly unthinkable: crowded lift lines.
Many Utahns are also wary f the Olympics coming to town. In fact, 90
percent of the local Sports Guide readers we polled said that they
wanted no part of the winter games circus. They expressed concerns
about Utah receiving too much international exposure. And many readers
simply thought that having the Olympics come to town would flood the
Wasatch with refugees; that somehow our backcountry would become choked
with infidels.
But the truth is, the out-of-towners arent’ the reason that Utah is one
of the fastest growing populations in the nation. If our population is
growing out of control, and if the Wasatch backcountry is in jeopardy
of being overrun or even developed outright, we need to understand that
this is by our own hand. Why? Because we Utahns love to make babies.
The average Utah mother gives birth to five children in her lifetime.
And the national average still hovers somewhere around 2.2. of those
five children, perhaps one of them will venture off to another state
(Idaho). The remaining four will stay and breed right here in Utah. And
why would they want to go anywhere else? If they’re religious, they
know that they’re in the center of the universe. And if they’re
adventurous, they know they’re in the sporting capital of the world.
It’s not the Olympics the are putting the squeeze on the backcountry.
It’s us.
So don’t sweat the Olympics. The New Yorkers will eventually go home.
And the Europeans will hate it here anyway. Those three weeks in
February will be a time when we can really let our hair down. It will
be the biggest party that Utah is likely to ever see. Like Spring Break
in St. George, the town will take on a whole new look, with
spectators-turned-partygoers taking to the streets. Music will be
bumpin’. Confetti will be flying. And we’ll all run amok with cold
beers in hand. Our peculiar little world will finally swallow a
much-needed dose of pure, uncut pandemonium.
And if dancing in the streets isn’t your bag, head back into the
mountains. Choose the right canyon and you’ll find that the lift lines
will be empty. And the backcountry will be casual. The only ting that
will be different is that we’ll have more snow than we ever dreamed
possible.
This January issue is a tribute to the 2002 Winter Olympics. Peta came
up big with a story about Utah’s own Picabo Street. Jill gives readers
the low-down on Snowbasin’s revered (and feared) Downhill Course. And
for you out-of-towners, Tom Price has provided a guide to surviving
Salt Lake City. Carry it with you always.
I am also pleased to announce that this January issue marks Sports
Guide Magazine’s 20th anniversary. These past few years have been
pretty rough on the magazine industry. Many publications have fallen
out of the race in the past five months. And in an industry where
exactly 98-percent of all magazines go out of business within the first
year, Sports Guide’s achievement is nothing short of remarkable.
So for those of you that have been faithful, long-time readers, you
have a lot to be thankful for this year. The Olympics are here. The
Powder is here. And the Sports Guide is STILL here.
Lookin’ forward to our 50th,
Ben
More Ben Tiffany articles here
|
|
|
|