Will Paid "POW Parking" at Squaw Adversely Effect POW as an Organization?

[GPP33]

I think POW has lots of hypocrisy. I know numerous board members and members alike, who fly private and are using rotary aircraft to ski.
Those two vehicles burn more fuel and damage the environment more than most. So they should put their money where their mouth is, and curtail their usage.

Just saying.

Don't worry, I can't afford to fly all around the world and ride in helicopters so they are just using what I'm leaving on the table. It's like carbon credits, it's only fair.

[TBS]

I'm all for preferred parking and/or discounts for drivers that both carpool and shod their vehicles with the appropriate tires. That would do wonders for the regular parking lots that occur on Hwy 26 on Mt Hood.

My Hood Meadows use to have preferred parking for 3+ carpools. Did that program die?

[shaft]

I agree, but *unpopular opinion* it's well past time for paid parking at most ski areas in North America.

Glad you brought that up. However, and this is true from the beaches to the cities to the mountains, paid parking as an economic disincentive only works if it is perfectly sized and correlated to the driver's income. If Freakonomics did an episode on this, I'm almost certain they would say "pay-for-parking disincentives lower income skiers to park, and will result in higher income skiers being happy to pay to park."

In the sectors in which I practice, I have not seen increases in price actually drive down use, as many theorize. IMHO, it just adds hidden costs, which never really go away. Ticketmaster fees, electricity rate increases, water bills, etc. Careful what you wish for...

[PNWbrit]

Careful what you wish for...

Back in parking.

Apparently.

[Grizz]

I don't think ski areas in Oregon can charge a premium for preferred parking. Something about ODOT rules and snopark permits. Hoodoo would be the exception because they decided to plow their own lot.

I'm sure if allowed it would have already happened at MHM, to increase the ratio of skiers per parking lot space.

[gone2alpine]

Given that the current Squaw/Alterra business model is encouraging more and more long distance travel by skiers via the iKon pass...the destination ones that stay for a week and spend money in villages...the POW parking is most definitely greenwashing.
Should they encourage paid parking? Yes, once the alternatives are more developed. They are also toying with park and ride and yet another micro transit system. The time to implement paid parking is after they have fleshed out the bugs in the alternatives.

[Sirshredalot]

Glad you brought that up. However, and this is true from the beaches to the cities to the mountains, paid parking as an economic disincentive only works if it is perfectly sized and correlated to the driver's income. If Freakonomics did an episode on this, I'm almost certain they would say "pay-for-parking disincentives lower income skiers to park, and will result in higher income skiers being happy to pay to park."

In the sectors in which I practice, I have not seen increases in price actually drive down use, as many theorize. IMHO, it just adds hidden costs, which never really go away. Ticketmaster fees, electricity rate increases, water bills, etc. Careful what you wish for...

This is why we don't let dumb dumb lawyers near important work. Are you claiming you've discovered a bunch of Giffen Goods? You're either a potential Nobel Prize winner or functionally retarded. I know where my money lies, but feel free to publish your findings and prove me wrong.

Demand slopes downward. People buy less of something when it is more expensive. This goes double for something with high price salience like expensive paid parking. That's life, guys, even when we don't like the implications for our lifestyle choices.

[bfree]

Mandatory paid parking at ski areas makes no sense because there is no reasonable alternative to getting to the mountain. What am I supposed to do, ride my bike there or take a bus that doesn't exist? Then it just becomes a hidden cost. Plus it disincentivizes me to head up for a quick couple hours during which I might buy a slice of pizza or a beer.

Paid elite parking is fine if there is a free alternative. If the resort wants to try and milk a few more bucks from the wealthy that don't want to walk a few extra minutes, more power to them. If they want to donate the proceeds to POW, even better.

[mmmm...pow!]

I agree, but *unpopular opinion* it's well past time for paid parking at most ski areas in North America.

Explain? Paid parking anywhere is just a money grab. I pretty much refuse to park anywhere I have to pay. I already paid for the product, now I'm supposed to pay more to access said product? Fuck that. That's as bad as towns that charge to park and use the revenue to pay for someone to enforce it (Truckee comes to mind).
Anyone thinking Alterra is any different from KSL, it's the same people with a fancy new name. Their big solution to traffic (other than the parking lot fiasco) is a few tiny little buses to serve the relative handful of people already in the valley. But you need an app, so it's like totally cutting edge. As it is now, I've actually considered using TART on busy days, but one trip per hour makes it tough to time it right. Seriously, if they ran a free shuttle to Tahoe City or Truckee (like most "world class" ski areas do to their neighboring towns) every 15 minutes, I'd take it.
I have noticed that the past few days the gates were up for anyone to access the paid lot by late morning.

[old goat]

As I said in another thread one of the reasons Squaw may be doing this is that one of the big issues in the law suit Sierra Watch filed is traffic. If SV can show that they are trying to do something about the traffic they stand a better chance of prevailing. If and when they get the village built you can count on them to make driving to the mountain as inconvenient and expensive as possible--they will have a lot of beds in the valley to fill.

I'm not informed as to how mass transit in other ski areas is financed but my impression is that it is generally provided by the local city, town, or county jurisdiction--making use of tax dollars generated by the resort and other businesses. Developing a decent (15 minute max wait) mass transit in north tahoe/truckee would require the kind of progressive thinking that is totally out of the skill set of Placer County, which sees tourism as a cash cow to fund services in the west county. It would also require a cooperative effort between Placer County and the Town of Truckee--something out of both jurisdictions' skill sets.

[Pass Rat]

I think POW has lots of hypocrisy. I know numerous board members and members alike, who fly private and are using rotary aircraft to ski.
Those two vehicles burn more fuel and damage the environment more than most. So they should put their money where their mouth is, and curtail their usage.

Just saying.

Pro skiers are largely no different than pro athletes from any other sports. While there are some absolutely fantastic people who ski for a living, there are also some who are dicks and raging hypocrites.

[LeoK]

I feel like saying a few words on POW:

I is very easy to call them out on hypocrisy but really I think this is part of why we can relate to them in the first place. Imagine Jeremy Jones would be a vegan dude cycling to his local hill and if you ever have some fries for lunch he would be all like: "oh that potato is not from biological agriculture and was fried with electricity form a coal! You are killing the planet! You suck!"

I guess you see where I am going. I think POW does a great job in showing you what you really can do about climate change without giving up all fun in live. That is why they are rooted in the winter-sports community wich is a hedonistic endeavor in the first place and does nothing good for the climate as a whole.

Of course as a professional Snowboarder or Skier you travel way above what you should if you consider climate change. I think we all do this to a lesser extend, too. No Jeremy has done a film in his backyard without any air travel (Ode to Muir) but yes he has done "art of flight", too. But I still think it is better to be aware and offset you emission than just doing nothing or complain.

Also you have to consider that Jones by reaching many people has a certain effect through those people reducing their emissions - the basic idea of POW (cool people, great athletes have a big audience and some street cred). Now you could also argue that with high class movies he became what he is and those movies reached a lot of people and needed to produce significant CO2 emissions. BUT through those movies he created the impact he later had as he became active on climate change. No compare to the vegan JJ complaining about your french fires... I guess you get my point: doing something is better than doing nothing and calling out people who at least make some effort to be hypocrites because if they would be really only about climate protection they would not ski and you could not talk to them and the whole idea of POW would not work!

Back to the parking issue: Is the paid parking really part of the POW program or is it more like "POW Carpool" + a second thing (="Paid parking") and a fault of the resort.

Anyways I agree that this system is not ideal as it privileges rich people. That is a bit like heli-skiing: very bad for the climate but the global effect is not so big as it is to expensive for many. So the system is anti social but still good for climate protection.

On further notice carpooling is part of their popular POW 7 campaign and therefor it makes senes to just call the carpool area POW-Carpool. POW 7 is showing you hoe without to much reduction of hedonism and fun you can reduce your emissions.

[Kirby]

adding "POW" to the name looks like nothing more than greenwashing

But that's what POW is. Green paint. Green paint used to hide a predominantly white, upper-middle class industry's inherent antithetical stance on good "environmental stewardship" (i.e. consumerism, globalization, development, etc.). I mean, they post pictures of people on Everest on their Instagram feed. How fuckin' tone-deaf...



Whatever though, just neo-liberals being neo-liberals (i.e. wealthy, white people get to pollute, while the rest of us pick up the bill).

[skiitsbetter]

Also you have to consider that Jones by reaching many people has a certain effect through those people reducing their emissions - the basic idea of POW (cool people, great athletes have a big audience and some street cred). Now you could also argue that with high class movies he became what he is and those movies reached a lot of people and needed to produce significant CO2 emissions. BUT through those movies he created the impact he later had as he became active on climate change.

Ok, but if you are advocating for shutting down industries and putting people out of work, people whose individual footprint is less than 1/10 of a typical POW ambassador, you should look at your own footprint. I don't see why it isn't a reasonable challenge to make a progressive shred film based in the area around where you live. Set a positive example for us. No airplanes, no helicopters, no snowmobiles, no F350's.

Unrelated, but All.I.Can. was garbage. "We should save the planet, but snowmobiliing (and driving my big ass truck to the trailhead) is too much fun, so I'm not going to give that up"

[LeoK]

Sorry I don't see where this is going so step by step:

Ok, but if you are advocating for shutting down industries and putting people out of work, people whose individual footprint is less than 1/10 of a typical POW ambassador, you should look at your own footprint.

Who is advocating this? Me? Jones? Nobody talked about jobs so far (or did I miss that?) and economic wealth is not strictly related to polluting the atmosphere as far as I know.
But yes, everyone should look at his footprint. It is just that saving our planet will not work if you refuse to care as long as somebody has a bigger footprint.

I don't see why it isn't a reasonable challenge to make a progressive shred film based in the area around where you live. Set a positive example for us. No airplanes, no helicopters, no snowmobiles, no F350's.

Who should set the example? I don't do films, they would suck big time. Jones did Ode to Muir but it is not at all what I would call a shred film. But I guess that is his take on the matter.
In general: agreed. But if you want to blame Jones you have to see at what point in his life he did what.

Unrelated, but All.I.Can. was garbage. "We should save the planet, but snowmobiliing (and driving my big ass truck to the trailhead) is too much fun, so I'm not going to give that up"

Agreed this is unrelated and true.
_________

My point was: The climate does not care if you are a hypocrite or not as long as you do something to reduce your impact. Therefore: a hypocrite doing something to reduce the negative impact of humanity on climate is more helpful than a non-hypocrite doing nothing but complaining about POW.

Than I just tried to elaborate on the issue that POW is rotted in winter sports and winter sports is bad for the climate -> so being blamed for being hypocritical is kind of inherent...

Now you can scale this anyway you want. But my conclusion is: POW is great, they take action and reach people without being a total pain in the ass and telling you to stop skiing at all.

[TahoeJ]

Greg Hill may be the only POW ambassador that has taken significant steps to reduce his carbon foot print. dude almost exclusively drives an electric car now, keeps it local and turns down trips aboard, and gets veggie 5x a week.

Let's also give a shout out to his partner in crime Chris Rubens. Ian Mac has also made big changes as well.

So it seems the Canadians are doing a much better job than the Americans?

I think a lot of people don't understand the reality of transportation in Tahoe. Mass transit options SUCK and are not reliable.

[total_immortal]

Who should set the example?

Maybe POW?

I understand that they are great at bringing attention to climate change and perhaps raising awareness (but who isn't already aware of climate change? especially winter recreationists). I think they would be a much more respectable organization if they led by example. Perhaps all these athletes are buying carbon credits to offset their international travel and heli time, but POW doesn't seem to be promoting and educating people about how to offset their carbon footprint. If they simply said in their instagram posts that Hillary Nielson and Jim Morrison offset their Lhotse trip by buying credits and providing instructions on ways I could follow that example it would make a bigger impression on me.

[Jong Lafitte]

I once won a Finlandia wodka POW T-shirt at the end of season raffle at MJ. I liked it, so I wore it, but then it got a stain on it. I still wear it, but now, there is a stain on it.


True story.

[shaft]

I feel like saying a few words on POW:

I is very easy to call them out on hypocrisy but really I think this is part of why we can relate to them in the first place. Imagine Jeremy Jones would be a vegan dude cycling to his local hill and if you ever have some fries for lunch he would be all like: "oh that potato is not from biological agriculture and was fried with electricity form a coal! You are killing the planet! You suck!"

I guess you see where I am going. I think POW does a great job in showing you what you really can do about climate change without giving up all fun in live. That is why they are rooted in the winter-sports community wich is a hedonistic endeavor in the first place and does nothing good for the climate as a whole...

...On further notice carpooling is part of their popular POW 7 campaign and therefor it makes senes to just call the carpool area POW-Carpool. POW 7 is showing you how without to much reduction of hedonism and fun you can reduce your emissions.

QFT. If you're replying to this thread, and are a POW-hater, GTFO. POW is trying hard and has a specific focus on educating riders and lobbying politicians. Both are important, noble, and awesome.

...Back to the parking issue: Is the paid parking really part of the POW program or is it more like "POW Carpool" + a second thing (="Paid parking") and a fault of the resort.

Well said. POW isn't doing this, and they aren't getting the money either.

What I'm asking: Is POW lending their name to something which Alterra is using nefariously? Is this going to negatively effect the non-profit in the long-haul?

I'm concerned it will tarnish the name, and that would suck. Martin Litton would be uncompromising on something like this. POW should consider the name they've built over the past decade, and the be wary of potential consequences of abuse of that name by for-profit enterprises.
------------------------
For clarification on what the resort is doing: when the free lot fills up at 9am, those without 3-to-a-car will be forced to pay $30. In my opinion, this is part of a 3 or 4-year strategy to phase out free parking. Por ejemplo: they slowly phased out half day passes over the years and officially removed them this month. Fuck that. Statement from lift ticket sales was "it was only $10 less last year." Being able to say that sentence, and make removing half-day passes seem reasonable, was a long-term strategy to limit blowback. It appears the parking strategy may be the same, using POW as the lever.

[TahoeJ]

Well of course it's greenwashing. Duh.

They're partnered with a company trying to build the largest project of all time in the Tahoe area. Talk about carbon emissions.

[Pass Rat]

To answer the actual question posed by OP, I don't think this coopting of the POW brand by Squaw will have any detrimental effect on POW. Corporations have been greenwashing/human rights washing/pretending their products are something they are not with the help of some NGO for a very long time. While some of these NGOs have gotten their supporters turned up over it, any actual consequence for the NGO seems to be nonexistent.

[NorCalNomad]

lol at all the people in here letting perfection be the enemy of good.

None of the POW ambassadors claim they're the Mother Teresa or Gandhi of environmentalism. They realize that being professional athletes means they have to travel more than your average developed country citizen. Yeah Greg and some others are taking some real big steps to set an example, but not being able to see the picture shows a lack of thinking.

Really what these athletes are is tools to get the public to engage with the outdoors. No one is going to want to save the environment if they've never interacted with it. Empathy and selfishness is the easiest motivator for people.

My own empathy and selfishness example. Yeah I understand the importance of keeping the Boundary Waters up in MN healthy and pollution free (sympathy). But I'd be lying to say I care equally about it as Pacific coast and Sierra environmentally issues since those are the places I interact with and have self interest in keeping healthy.

Everything is a compromise.

But this Squaw parking thing is dumb. Makes me think renting out electric fat bikes with ski racks at both ends of 89 would be good business.

[old goat]

we have a lot bigger issues to face than whether we can keep skiing or not.
https://archives.newyorker.com/?i=2018-11-26#folio=46
whatever you think of POW doesn't matter

[Sirshredalot]

Maybe POW?

I understand that they are great at bringing attention to climate change and perhaps raising awareness (but who isn't already aware of climate change? especially winter recreationists). I think they would be a much more respectable organization if they led by example. Perhaps all these athletes are buying carbon credits to offset their international travel and heli time, but POW doesn't seem to be promoting and educating people about how to offset their carbon footprint. If they simply said in their instagram posts that Hillary Nielson and Jim Morrison offset their Lhotse trip by buying credits and providing instructions on ways I could follow that example it would make a bigger impression on me.

Patting ourselves on the back won't solve the problem. We need aggressive action from the government. Is POW effective as a lobbying organization? I know they want to be. That's where the rubber meets the road. Raising awareness and convincing a handful of bros to buy carbon credits doesn't solve anything.

[Greenstateofmind]

What am I supposed to do, ride my bike there or take a bus that doesn't exist?

Well, duh!?



Paid elite parking is fine if there is a free alternative. If the resort wants to try and milk a few more bucks from the wealthy that don't want to walk a few extra minutes, more power to them. If they want to donate the proceeds to POW, even better.

Seems like a pretty fair take on the scenario.

But...I still can't figure out how Riding POW is going to protect our winters and I'm a paid environmentalist. You can understand why the deniers get a little confused