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Vail’s employee housing moves forward

Melanie Wong
mwong@vaildaily.com
Vail, CO Colorado
Special to the DailyA Vail Resorts employee-housing apartment building planned for a parking lot in Lionshead gained a key approval Monday from Vail's planning commission.
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VAIL ” Vail is one step closer to getting 124 employee beds after town officials gave the North Day Lot project a key approval Monday.

Vail’s Planning and Environmental Commission gave Vail Resorts employee housing project its final approval ” one of the final hurdles for the project plan. It still needs to be reviewed by the town’s design review board.

For now, Vail Resorts Development Co. plans to start the housing project in spring of 2010.



The North Day Lot, located on the South Frontage Road at the end of the pedestrian overpass, is the planned site for Vail Resorts employee housing associated with the Arrabelle at Vail Square in Lionshead.

Right now, the 1-acre plot, flanked by the South Frontage Road, the Landmark Condominiums and the Westwind at Vail Condominiums, is the site of 105 Vail Resorts employee parking spaces and a skier drop-off area.

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New plans show a four-story, brown and green complex with a gabled roof, an underground garage, some short-term parking and a skier drop-off area. The skier area would have ample space for cars to turn around, and a heated, paved path will lead skiers toward the gondola, planners said.

The dormitory-style complex will have 32 units of mostly three-or four-bedroom apartments, said Dominic Mauriello of Mauriello Planning Group.

The 124 beds would be four more beds than originally required of Vail Resorts by the town. The project had about five fewer parking spaces than usually required of a project that size. Mauriello said that the extra spaces weren’t needed because the complex would be so close to the mountain and is also along the bus line and bike path.

Vail Resorts plans to replace the 105 spaces that will be lost when it builds Ever Vail, a proposed ski village in West Lionshead.

Until then, the company is trying to find a temporary lot nearby or a lot from which workers can be shuttled, said Tom Miller, director of development for Vail Resorts Development Co.

Planning commissioners’ only concern was construction parking while the project is built. Construction trucks in the past have caused parking problems and clogged up the town’s garages, they said.

Staff Writer Melanie Wong can be reached at 970-748-2928 or mwong@vaildaily.com.


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