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Forest Service hopes to scrap slope "shacks"   When huts become nuisance, it's time to go

By Jason Blevins
Denver Post Staff Writer
04/16/2007

The Forest Service is putting its foot down on slopeside shacks. Those listing lean-tos tucked in the trees are being targeted by some Forest Service rangers across the state. Last week the Forest Service's winter sports administrator in Aspen called for the end of shack proliferation on Snowmass slopes.

"It's more an issue of stopping the growth of these things. Some of them are pretty extravagant," Forest Service ranger Jim Stark said. "The ski area talked to me this winter and they wanted to discuss some concerns and what we thought about their liability."

This winter, Stark and some Snowmass ski patrollers visited a newly erected shack accessed by what he called some "pretty hairball skiing." While up in the shanty, a young boy skied by with his father.

"It really is drawing some kids into places where they normally would not be," Stark said. "It's not a resource damage issue - the ones I've seen use dead trees - it's more a junk thing. Our discussion with the ski area has been if they come across them, just clean them up. We want to get the message out that this is not allowed and don't keep building these things."

Shacks on ski hills are hardly new. Some date back a couple of decades and are carefully maintained by unknown visitors. While some are tree houses found up in the canopy, most are simply stacked dead timber with room for a couple of folks to sit. More often than not, the shacks can be smelled because of marijuana smoke before they are seen.

The Forest Service does not rank the so-called "smoke shacks" very high on its lengthy list of priorities, but when a hut becomes an issue for a ski area, the Forest Service has no problem ordering its removal.

"We see them as unauthorized structures on public land," said Don Dressler, a snow ranger with the Forest Service's Holy Cross district. "It's a nuisance more than a natural resource concern."

Dressler said patrollers from Vail and Beaver Creek usually notify him when they find a new shack and he will go visit, looking for any kind of safety issue or resource damage like freshly hewn timber. It's up to the ski hill to remove the structures when they can, Dressler said.

At Mary Jane, there are more than 20 huts hidden in the woods, some built by loggers who first thinned the hill for skiing more than 30 years ago. The mountain's patrollers rarely bother with removing the storied shacks.

"There are probably more than we even know about," Winter Park spokesman Matt Sugar said. "The only time it becomes an issue is when they get trashy, and that's not common. In a very limited number of cases we've had to take them down if it becomes a hazard."