Posted inEnvironment, News, Outdoors, Outsider

Monarch Pass could serve as a new model for wildfire mitigation in treacherous areas

MONARCH PASS — Sergio Bernal casually flicks his wrist and the towering spruce falls. The Oregon forester presses a button and buzzing saws de-limb the beetle-killed tree and slice it into 33-foot logs. A giant claw swings the tree to the side and the slash falls to the forest floor. The eight-wheeled Finnish machine — […]

Posted inBusiness, Environment, News, Politics and Government

How bad are Coloradans at recycling? Chaffee County contractor closed its free sites over bad actors, slim profits

Angel of Shavano Recycling spent 15 years sifting through Chaffee County’s trash collecting its treasures — plastics, cardboard, paper, newspaper, tin and aluminum. But slim profits and bad behavior by customers led the owner, Mickey Barry, to close the gates on the four free community recycling sites.  “In the recycling industry the drop sites have […]

Posted inBusiness, Economy, Environment, Transportation

New plans for rail traffic over Colorado’s Tennessee Pass spark protest from grain-hauling competitor

The Rio Grande Pacific Corp., based in Fort Worth, Texas, has the lease to run trains on the long-dormant lines between Cañon City and Dotsero. But it will be many years before passenger cars and tankers filled with the freight-mover’s crude oil traverse Tennessee Pass — and not just because costs to fix the line […]

Posted inBusiness, Coloradans, Environment, Growth, News, Outdoors

Nestlé’s plan to pump 65 million gallons of Arkansas River water to Denver for bottling stirs contentious fight

NATHROP — Dozens of Chaffee County residents lined up Thursday to virtually blast a plan by Nestlé Waters North America to pump up to 65 million gallons of groundwater a year out of the Upper Arkansas River Valley for bottling in Denver.  “We don’t need Nestlé to bottle our water and sell it back to […]