VAIL VALLEY — Vail Valley resident Vince Cook is used to thinking big. Now he's leading a team trying to float the biggest idea Eagle County since the Vail ski resort.

Cook is a Beaver Creek resident whose resume includes a career with IBM, a medal from NASA for managing development of the space shuttle and the 2002 Beaver Creek “Citizen of the Year” award. He has teamed up with other locals to try to launch “GreenPort.” The idea ties together rail and bus transit, workforce housing and ideas about “sustainable” communities into a package that runs from Dotsero to Minturn, and, perhaps, Red Cliff and Leadville.

The idea has already been floated to a handful of local town boards and metro districts, all of which have expressed support up to, but not including, the point at which checks have to be written. The Eagle County Commissioners have seen a presentation, but remain wary of the project's costs and the potential effects on the valley's growth patterns.

The idea

In a long phone conversation, Cook said the idea's genesis came in a call from friends Chupa Nelson and Ross Graves — Graves is now a member of the project team — who asked Cook if he'd be interested in talking about ideas to help give the valley's economy a boost.

“We wanted an idea for workforce housing like Miller Ranch, with high quality and LEED certification,” Cook said. “Over the course of 10 years, we could create some quality workforce housing in the valley.”

Out of that first idea — spurred by a county study just a few years ago that indicated the county would need at least 3,000 new units of workforce housing over the next couple of decades — evolved a bigger, bolder notion that included money from new federal initiatives.

The friends started talking about the prospect of funding from federal agencies including the Department of Housing and Urban Development, the Department of Energy and federal and state departments of transportation.

Cook, who most recently has been working with a company involved in the “clean coal” business, said he now “paints everything green.” During the brainstorming sessions, he wondered if the workforce housing villages could be tied together along the valley's rail line.

“My approach was (rail) would make it more complex, but more powerful,” Cook said.

So, with some startup cash in hand, Cook, Graves and Susan Lambert, a former vice president with CH2M Hill, a Front Range environmental engineering company, got to work and came up with “GreenPort.”

Selling the plan

With a basic plan in hand, the team has this year been selling the idea to local governments. At this point, the team has sought, and received, resolutions of support from every board that's heard the plan.

“I think it's a great idea,” Eagle Town Board Member Roxie Deane said. “The problem is the money, but it looks like he's working hard to find it.”

But there's a lot of money to be found. The GreenPort PowerPoint presentation shows a project that could exceed $600 million, with money coming from local, state and federal sources as well as the private sector.

But with the exception of the currently free-spending federal government, money's tight at the state and local levels, and private capital is hard to come by, too.

For Cook, though, finding a half-billion dollars is just part of the process.

“I think in terms of milestones,” Cook said. “If we don't make them, then we don't move forward.”

The latest milestone is finding about another $1 million in seed money from public and private sources. Without it, Cook said the GreenPort plan could be out of business in 90 days.

But Cook believes in this plan, and thinks he can get other people to believe, and write checks.

Selling the railroad

Cook's belief in the plan extends to being able to hammer out a deal to lease the Union Pacific's track through the valley. Local government types start scratching their heads whenever anyone brings up anything that needs cooperation from the railroad.

“The biggest problem I've seen over the years is the railroad,” Deane said. “It's just hard dealing with them.”

But Cook, who has spent decades dealing with politicians and business leaders all over the world, thinks he might have an edge. Part of getting things done is knowing who to talk to, and, without naming names, Cook said he believes he has that information.

“I think I know what pew of the church I need to sit in for this,” he said.

He thinks he knows where he needs to sit in Denver, too.

Cook did say he's had several conversations with Don Marostica of the Colorado Office of Economic Development and International Trade. While Cook hasn't gotten any promises, he will say that Marostica believes the GreenPort idea might be a winner.

Trains are sexy

Part of the idea's appeal is its scope. Another is that it uses trains.

“Trains draw people's attention more than buses,” Matt Scherr of the Eagle Valley Alliance for Sustainability said. “And trains can address transit oriented development issues in a way buses can't.”

Throw in trains, LEED-certified homes and other “green” elements, and Scherr said it's easy to see GreenPort's appeal.

Scherr said he understands the questions being asked about GreenPort — whether it will bring unwanted growth and whether the plan could be done more effectively. But, he said, sometimes projects need some sizzle along with their substance.

“When you're talking about sustainability, sometimes you can sell it on sex appeal — that's often necessary from a political standpoint.”

And Cook believes GreenPort has the right combination of style and substance needed to make a project this size work.

Cook said his gut feeling is that GreenPort might be the right project at the right time, especially with the same party — Democrats — in power in both Denver and D.C. But the timeline is tight.

And, he added, “If this isn't in the public's interest, it won't work.”

Business Editor Scott N. Miller can be reached at 970-748-2930 or smiller@vaildaily.com.

GreenPort plan

GreenPort plan