Paying the way
Telluride gondola will carry on after voters approve tax increase
Telluride's iconic free gondola takes passengers roughly 2 miles up and over the ski area to nearby Mountain Village. Since opening in 1996, the gondola has largely been funded by the Mountain Village Owner's Association. But that agreement is expiring at the end of 2027, and area voters recently passed a measure to raise taxes to help fund the gondola going forward./ Photo by Hart Van Denburg/CPR News
by Nathaniel Minor
Colorado Public Radio
Voters in the Telluride area approved a ballot measure that will help secure the future of the town’s hugely popular, free gondola.
The gondola opened in 1996 and transports more than 3 million people a year – more than many of the RTD’s light rail and commuter rail lines in the Denver metro. It’s the only free public transit system like it in the United States, local officials say, and is used by locals and tourists alike.
“It’s accessible, free, high-quality, frequent transportation for everybody that walks up to the door,” David Averill, executive director of San Miguel Authority for Regional Transportation, said. “You don’t have to be special to ride it. That’s a great equalizer.”
The gondola carries passengers between Telluride and Mountain Village in 13 minutes, faster than drivers can make the 8-mile trek by road. Averill credits it with reducing traffic congestion and parking issues in both communities.
“It’s probably the biggest bang for the buck in greenhouse gas emission (reductions) in this region,” he said.
But the gondola’s age, popularity and looming financial hurdles meant it needed investment.
It runs for about 5,000 hours a year, Averill said, far more than a seasonal ski lift, and lines to ride can last for over an hour during busy holidays.
The gondola’s construction and operations have largely been funded by fees collected by the Telluride Mountain Village Owners Association. But with the association’s 30-year agreement expiring at the end of 2027, local officials and businesses decided to ask voters across the region to take on the collective burden of shoring up the gondola’s future.
They obliged, by a somewhat narrow margin, by passing Measure 3A, which will increase property, sales and lodging taxes to raise $8.2 million a year.
Most of that new money will enable the regional transportation authority to take over responsibility for the gondola in 2028 and also allow it to start saving money for a replacement that could cost between $60 million - $100 million, Averill estimated. It’s not clear when that will happen, but planners want a new gondola capable of moving more people to meet the ever-growing demand.
Campaign finance records show that the measure’s backers received $60,000 from a Florida-based developer that is planning a nearly $1 billion Four Seasons resort near a gondola station in Mountain Village, and another $10,000 from Wyoming-based Shaw Construction.
In addition, about $1 million a year of the new tax revenue will fund improvements to bus service to down-valley communities where many workers live. In all, the regional transportation authority’s annual revenue of about $2 million will jump to about $10 million once the new tax kicks in, Averill said.
“I think it’s just sort of a natural evolution of things, but this is quite an inflection point for the organization. There’s no doubt about it,” he said.
Not everyone is excited about more taxes. More than 1,700 voters cast their ballots against 3A, including Erin Ries, who works in marketing and advertising and has lived in Telluride for 35 years. Ries said she sees the value of the gondola but believes Mountain Village should pay the bulk of its expenses.
“I’m just saying, they’re building a huge hotel. The onus is on them. They’re the ones that need it,” she said in an interview with CPR News.
Telluride, like most Colorado ski towns, is already an extremely expensive place to live, she said. Though her home on main street is “probably worth $4 million,” Ries said she isn’t wealthy. The house was a ski-bum crash pad when she and her partner bought it for less than $1 million more than a decade ago, and the couple put lots of sweat equity into it.
“We got lucky,” she said, adding: “It’s hard to live here … I want people to be able to buy here and live here. And things like this make it very difficult for locals.”
Averill said the groups that drafted the ballot language – local governments, the Telluride ski resort, the Telluride Mountain Village Owner’s Association and the transit authority – all compromised with each other to come up with the ultimately successful measure.
“This is the best way that leadership thought we could get there,” he said. “So that’s what we went for.”
For more from Colorado Public Radio, go to: www.cpr.org