Pikes Peak Region Trail Finder

End of the run for Pikes Peak ski area?

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Created on Thursday, 11 November 2010 22:25

Written by R. Scott Rappold

By R. SCOTT RAPPOLD

THE GAZETTE

The plan for a ski area on Pikes Peak appears to be dead, or at least frozen.

Colorado securities regulators last month ordered John C. Ball, a Boulder entrepreneur who formed a company called The Resort at Pikes Peak in 2007, to stop selling stock in the project.

The company’s website, skipikespeak.com, has been taken down, and the water district that was considering selling water for snow-making says it has not heard from Ball in two years.

Ball did not return calls for comment Thursday.

The 320 acres targeted for the ski area on the west side of Pikes Peak are owned by Harvey Carter, who has been talking to investors about building a ski area there for decades. He claims his property is on the snowiest part of the mountain.

The latest plan called for lift-served skiing, a large hotel and condominiums near the Crags. Some called it quixotic, noting the failures of past ski areas in the region, but Ball and Carter said it could succeed.

“It would be like Eldora, just above Boulder,” Ball told The Gazette in 2008. “People don’t necessarily come from out of state to ski it, but the community loves it because it’s so close. My kids can take the bus up to Eldora in 30 minutes.”

According to Division of Securities documents, Ball had an agreement to pay Carter $2,500 a month, but that agreement was cancelled in March of this year after Ball stopped making payments.

Securities regulators received a complaint in July about the venture, and investigators found the website was still soliciting investments, projecting a $16,400 return on a $10,000 investment. The site also included a business plan indicating the company would buy Carter’s land and projecting revenues of $4.3 million in the first year, $9.3 million in the second and $11 million in the third.

State regulators accused Ball of securities fraud by offering investment via the website and not disclosing that the land deal had expired. Ball agreed to a cease-and-desist order, which was signed Tuesday.

Carter did not return calls for comment Thursday, so it is unclear what the news means for his longtime goal of offering skiing on the peak. His past efforts have been doomed by the inability to attract investors.

Stan Wolf, owner of west-side ski shop Colorado Kite and Ski, was not surprised.

“It’s so hard for an individual to go ahead and try and open a ski area, versus a big corporation like Vail (Resorts),” Wolf said. But he believes one here would be successful.

“It would be a heck of a boost for the community if we were able to get a ski area on Pikes Peak. That would be wonderful. Right now you have to travel two hours to the closest ski area,” Wolf said.

Poor snowfall has doomed past ski areas, including one on the north side of Pikes Peak that closed in 1984 and Ski Broadmoor on the east face near the resort in 1991.

There was disappointment Thursday in the Rainbow Valley subdivision. Connie Mays, resident and secretary of the Rainbow Valley Water District, which talked to Ball in 2008, said the district informally voiced support for selling water for snow-making at the proposed ski area, and she thought the venture had a better chance of success than past efforts.

But they never heard from Ball again.

“We were all hepped up about the project and everyone thought it would be wonderful for Rainbow Valley, and then the economic downturn came and we never heard anything more,” she said.