The following message was posted to the Sierra Club’s forum. It should be noted that the Sierra Club does not ‘officiallly’ endorse this Sierra Club Activist Project called ‘ Stop Squaw Valley Over development’.

Stop Squaw Valley Over Development

Posted by The Sierra Club 

Squaw Valley is proposing a new village development beyond existing village. They are proposing quadrupling the amount of beds to ‘sustain’ a profitable, year round resort. It will irreversibly harm current aquifer water tables by over consumption. It will cause environmental degradation to a fragile, alpine ecosystem. It will create a huge carbon footprint due to construction. It will create major traffic congestion problems on an inadequate road system. It will coincide with an already oversized similar development project at Homewood Mountain Resort along Lake Tahoe’s west shore, adding to an already congested traffic corridor. Let’s prevent this overdevelopment from harming this historical, beautiful, high sierra environment more than has been already. Squaw Valley Ski are in California, was sold to KSL Resorts, a division of KSL Capital partners sometime in 2010. KSL’s main purpose is to build out the current parking area owned by KSL with luxury condominiums, town homes and hotel rooms. Some of these structures proposed to be built are 10 stories high. Double the height of the current buildings in the Village at Squaw. These structures will be very harmful to the environment in many environmental ways. Their overall carbon footprint to construct and their enormous requirements of potable water that will be taken from an already compromised aquifer and scarce water resources. The traffic issues concerning congestion and gridlock are not being properly addressed by the developers, planners and permitting agency of Placer County. There is no current contingency plan for traffic mitigation, nor emergency service plan during peak times and inclement weather. The plans call for subterranean excavation for underground parking and infrastructure. This will not fall within proper setback limits for the aquifer which provides potable water for 2 service districts. KSL plans to raise the grade of the proposed site plan by using transported fill. This will add to the already huge carbon footprint and traffic congestion. KSL has admitted it will sell the entire resort property that it now owns in Squaw Valley after completion of this development project. This project is not necessary for accommodating visitors to the Tahoe Truckee area as there is already a surplus of luxury condominiums and hotel beds in the ski resort at Squaw which currently cannot be filled. This currently proposed KSL project is a classic example of corporate greed and leveraged buyouts which has proven to not be good for the environment. Please take some time to learn about KSL Resorts and KSL Capital Partners and their plans to over develop Squaw Valley. We need to stop this project from happening. The grim consequences will be a more polluted environment, extreme pressure on scarce water supplies, greater traffic congestion and air pollution and visual pollution of high rise hotel condominium structures set against the scenery of the Sierra Crest. Proposed plan map http://wp.usatodaysports.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/88/2012/11/new-village.pdf

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102 replies on “Sierra Club – “Stop Squaw Valley Over Development””