The Colorado Rocky Mountains were blessed with abundant snow over the holiday season and unfortunately ski traffic was also brimming with accidents snarling traffic throughout the high country. At one point I saw i70 shut down an entire day leading to 90 minutes between Frisco and Breckenridge. What does this mean for ski real estate? Will ski traffic lead to lower real estate prices? How can Colorado easily rectify the ski traffic issues?
Here is a snipped of just one of the hundreds of incidents
Eastbound Interstate 70 was forced to close on Monday due to adverse weather conditions, but the closure occurred after more than a dozen tractor-trailers passed the chain station without being forced to chain up.
The interstate reopened shortly before 5 p.m.
Highway 24 — a popular detour around Vail Pass — closed for a couple hours between 3 and 5 p.m. Loveland Pass in Summit County is closed as well.
What does the increased traffic mean for ski real estate prices
The graph above shows all you need to know. Breckenridge is substantially under performing Vail and Steamboat Springs. A primary driver of this divergence in prices is due to the huge impacts from traffic.
On the flip side, Vail and Steamboat airports are adding substantial value as visitors can take a quick jumper from Denver and skip all the ski traffic coming out of the front range.
Every Colorado mountain town impacted by ski traffic
Even though Vail and Steamboat are less impacted by the i70 traffic due to their airports, every mountain town is feeling the pain via higher prices due to transportation costs. Think of the grocery store in Steamboat, the cost to ship goods via truck to steamboat has increased exponentially as a result of closures/delays on i70, this leads to considerably higher food prices. The same scenario plays out for building materials, etc…
What is causing the huge influx of accidents on i70?
There are three primary drivers of huge traffic incidents along the mountain corridor:
- Volume: it is a probability game as volumes grow so do the chances of accidents
- Lack of enforcement of chain laws: I can’t tell you how many times I’ve driven on i70 during chain laws and saw hundreds of trucks with no chains on and Colorado state patrol does nothing to enforce until the highway gets shut down
- Inexperienced drivers: With increased tourism comes more inexperienced drivers, I see this daily where drivers go way too fast or way too slow.
- Lack of proper traction on vehicles: It doesn’t matter if you have 4wd, awd, or part time 4wd the key component is snow tires, without proper tires, none of the other equipment will work properly.
Here is a good example of one of the leading causes of accidents. I was at Copper Mountain and watched a 4wd F150 spin out in the parking lot, there was less than an inch of snow and yet the driver still put the vehicle into a fish tail. It was a 4wd rental truck with summer tires and a driver that thought that the more you hit the accelerator the more traction you will get! It didn’t work out so well as he ended up in a snowbank snarling traffic as plows couldn’t get by and tow trucks had to shut down traffic to pull them out.
How do you solve the ski traffic problem
It really isn’t rocket science on how to solve the ski traffic problem in Colorado. Unfortunately the legislature is too busy trying to tax and spend than to actually solve problems that impact residents throughout a large portion of the state.
- Enforce commercial chain law with cameras at chain stations: Whenever chain laws are up, require every truck to go through the chain station, if they leave without chains they get a 1k ticket, this could all be automated almost like a speed camera
- Require all rental cars to come equipped with snow tires: This is common in other countries, when you rent a car in Calgary or parts of Europe, every car has the appropriate tires
- Require all vehicles to have chains/snow tires during inclement weather: In other states like Oregon, to go up to Mt. Hood you have to have chains or snow tires, there are checkpoints to ensure compliance, the same should occur here and they could simplify similar to the toll lanes where residents declare and send a pic of their winter tires installed and then they can bypass the check station
- Restrict non commercial trailers during inclement weather: When weather is very bad, there needs to be restrictions of non commercial vehicles. For example, I was behind a motorhome trailering a boat driving during chain laws, it was a disaster as they were going 15 miles per hour; these vehicles need to be restricted during inclement weather to eliminate accidents.
Traffic will continue to impact ski real estate until action is taken
The state of Colorado is putting their head in the sand thinking that by spending millions improving the highway in the foothills miraculously the issues on 170 will be reduced. Unfortunately the only way to improve i70 is to change behavior and implement the items above. Towns like Breckenridge and Winter Park will be more impacted as they are closer to the front range with no alternative to get there. Although Steamboat and Vail are still seeing increasing real estate prices, without a radical change in behavior every ski town will be impacted with increased costs of everything from groceries to building materials. Eventually the i70 traffic catastrophe will impact every mountain town and resident until the state of Colorado takes concrete action to radically alter behavior.
Additional Reading/Resources
https://www.summitdaily.com/news/vail-pass-highway-24-closed-amid-winter-weather/
We are a Colorado Private/ Hard Money Lender funding in cash!
If you were forwarded this message, please subscribe to our newsletter
I need your help! Do not worry, I’m not asking you to wire money to your long-lost cousin that is going to give you a million dollars if you just send them your bank account! I do need your help though, please like and share our articles on linked in, twitter, facebook, and other social media and forward to your friends/associates I would greatly appreciate it.
Glen Weinberg personally writes these weekly real estate blogs based on his real estate experience as a lender and property owner. He is the owner of Fairview Commercial Lending. Glen has been published as an expert in hard money lending, real estate valuation, financing, and various other real estate topics in Bloomberg, Businessweek ,the Colorado Real Estate Journal, National Association of Realtors Magazine, The Real Deal real estate news, the CO Biz Magazine, The Denver Post, The Scotsman mortgage broker guide, Mortgage Professional America and various other national publications.
Glen resides in Colorado, lends in Colorado, owns property in Colorado, and services loans in Colorado which provides a unique real estate prospective of what is actually happening on the ground both in Denver and throughout Colorado. My goal of this real estate blog is to provide an honest assessment of what I see happening in Colorado real estate and how it will impact real estate owners, buyers, realtors, mortgage professionals, etc…
Fairview is the recognized leader in Colorado Hard Money and Colorado private lending focusing on residential investment properties and commercial properties both in Denver and throughout the state. We are the Colorado experts having closed thousands of loans throughout the Front range, Western slope, resort communities, and everywhere in between. We also live, work, and play in the mountains throughout Colorado and understand the intricacies of each market.
When you call you will speak directly to the decision makers and get an honest answer quickly. We are recognized in the industry as the leader in Colorado hard money lending with no upfront fees or any other games. Learn more about Hard Money Lending through our free Hard Money Guide. To get started on a loan all we need is our simple one page application (no upfront fees or other games)
Tags: Denver hard money, Denver Colorado hard money lender, Colorado hard money, Colorado private lender, Denver private lender, Colorado ski lender, Colorado real estate trends, Colorado real estate prices, Private real estate loans, Hard money loans, Private real estate mortgage, Hard money mortgage lender, Hard money mortgage lender, residential hard money loans, commercial hard money loans, private mortgage lender Hard Money Lender, Private lender