One Steamboat Place enters the city planning phase
Steamboat is a more down to earth market where most people prefer to own all of their home. The Steamboat Grand is going to auction after 5 or so years of selling and they have 35 % of their units left to sell. The city encourages time shares to increase the number of warm beds but filling those beds with owners has been a challenge in Steamboat. I think that being in a new village at the base of the mountain may go a long way towards making those sales and this development team brings the level of quality and marketing to bring in the potential owners these time shares would be right for.
One Steamboat Place will go beyond creating luxury vacation units to establish public improvements that will modernize the ski area base. The planner for the project predicts that "One Steamboat Place will transform the south portion of the Steamboat ski base into a model for 21st century ski base design and provide an entirely new standard for future development projects there,".
From the Steamboat Pilot:
Construction of One Steamboat Place would include new facilities for some of the functions essential to the Steamboat Ski and Resort Corp., including a new ticket office and a new children's ski school entry. At the same time, the developers are asking the city for permission to build taller buildings than the code allows. The result would alter some views of Blacktail Mountain and the Flat Tops to the south.
City Planner Suzanne Bott said the developers' application shows ample evidence that they are working closely with the Ski Corp. I think it's exciting to see them working with the Ski Corp. on these opportunities," Bott said.
The site encompasses 4.3 acres and the gondola parking lot. The primary developer is a Carbondale man -- Jim Wells of SV Timbers Steamboat LLC. Whitney Ward and other owners in Wildhorse Meadows own the land One Steamboat Place would be built on. The Timbers group also has developed The Rocks Luxury Residence Club in Scottsdale, Ariz., and Esperanza in Cabo San Lucas, Mexico.
The plan submitted to the city of Steamboat Springs this month reflects an upper terminal for a people-mover gondola that would deliver skiers and shoppers to Gondola Square from Wildhorse Meadows and the nearby ski area remote parking lot. Bott said the inclusion of the gondola in the development application does not mean it necessarily would be built. The developers say discussions about how to share the cost of the gondola are taking place. Patten said that when built, the people mover would create new energy at the entrance to the ski area and would stimulate new shops and more efficient pedestrian walkways.
Bott said public discussions about One Steamboat Place are apt to lead the community to confront its expectations for the future of the ski area base. "It's a big philosophical leap people are going to have to adjust to," Bott said.