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It’s about time

Dear Editor:After reading the guest opinion by the Aspen Skiing Co. in your paper today (“Skico brass: Let’s fix the Entrance,” Jan. 31), I have a few questions for them and the Aspen City Council. I’ve lived here for the better part of 30 years and am co-owner of the Old Snowmass Conoco. When the Colorado Department of Transportation widened highway 82 in Snowmass Canyon, they created a less-than-desirable situation for my business and some of the local residents. It still sucks. As the Skico letter pointed out, there is no perfect solution, but there is a greater good, and I know lives have been saved with the improvements. Our response: get over it, roll with the changes, and take advantage of the positive while downplaying the negative.My question to the Skico is: What the hell took you so long? Come on, you’re the big gorilla on the block and have a tremendous sway on the economy of the entire valley! That power comes with a responsibility to use it and use it wisely. To stay silent for so long is to ignore that responsibility. To the credit of the Skico, they have stayed out of many issues which other ski area companies would have tried to control, but they are right when they say enough is enough. It’s about time they got involved.The experts have told us that the preferred alternative is the answer. Fine, let’s get started and I guarantee in a few years we’ll wonder what the big fuss was about. In fact, I suspect many of those opposed to the new Entrance will probably have moved back to wherever they came from … see ya. As for Aspen City Council, where to begin? You guys are a textbook case of how to screw up the public good. This issue should be history by now. The city government pays people to tell them the most efficient, environmentally sound way to proceed and then ignore the advice. It would be funny except it’s our overtaxed dollars you’re wasting.I would love to go back to the Aspen I first came to over 30 years ago. I’d also like a full head of hair and a chance to go back and fix some serious screw-ups in my life … ain’t gonna happen. It’s time to move forward and make the best community we can in a rapidly changing world. It may not be the perfect solution, but I believe we can tweak it along the way.Tony BrevettiOld Snowmass