Tamarack Resort

Tamarack Resort is a new four-season mountain resort in the Long Valley of west central Idaho. Tamarack is located on the west shore of Lake Cascade (Cascade Reservoir), southwest of Donnelly in Valley County, about 90 miles (145 km) north of Boise.

Overview

Tamarack is the first new ski resort to be built in North America in 23 years; Beaver Creek in Colorado and Deer Valley in Utah opened within days of each other in 1981. (Deer Valley was not entirely new, as it was built at the former ski area of "Snow Park," which operated from 1946-69.)

Location of Donnelly, Idaho

Tamarack was first conceived as Valbois in the early 1980s, but unsuccessfully struggled to overcome federal regulatory hurdles and fierce local opposition and folded in 1995. In 1998 a new group of investors revived the project, despite local oppositon, with modifications and called it WestRock. The name was changed to Tamarack in December 2002, after the tamarack larch, a deciduous coniferous tree.

Construction at the resort began in 2003, and the alpine ski area officially opened with chairlift service in December 2004. Tamarack has a lift-served summit elevation of 7660 feet (2335 m) above sea level on West Mountain (7672'), with a vertical drop of over 2700 feet (823 m). There are currently five quad chairlifts on the east-facing slopes, with two more proposed. The summit receives an average of 300 inches (762 cm) of snowfall, and snowmaking is available on the lower runs, due to poor snow cover. The terrain is rated at 15% novice, 56% intermediate, and 29% advanced.

View from the top of West Mountain, overlooking Lake Cascade.

For the cross country skier there are over 30 km (18.6 miles) of Nordic trails.

Golf

Osprey Meadows, a Robert Trent Jones II signature 18-hole golf course, opened in May 2006 with the addition of the back nine holes. The first nine holes opened for play in September 2005. The course is just southeast of the village and ski area base, at an average elevation of 4850 feet (1478 m). The back tees play at 7319 yards (6692 m), with 100 bunkers distributed on the course. Instruction at the golf course is provided by the Jack Nicklaus Academy of Golf.

In August 2005, President George W. Bush vacationed at the resort for two nights as a guest of Dirk Kempthorne, then the governor of Idaho. Kempthorne became the U.S. Secretary of Interior in May 2006.

In September 2006, recently retired tennis star Andre Agassi and wife Steffi Graf announced through their development company, after significant delays, that they finalized an agreement to develop a luxury mountain project at Tamarack. Groundbreaking was scheduled for 2007 with completion expected in 2009. This is their first lifestyle development project. [1]

When ultimately completed in 2015-20, Tamarack is projected to be a $1.5 billion destination resort with 62 ski runs, 7 chairlifts, two golf courses, and plentiful mountain biking trails. Funding is dubious, however, after the indeterminate delay of the Agassi/Graff project resulted in a temporary suspension of building at the resort.

Since January 2004, the resort has sold 531 properties for $359.3 million. This includes an additional nine lots than were originally planned for these phases that netted $42.7 million, they were captured by re-engineering the original plot design to eliminate wetlands.

Bankruptcy

The majority owners of Tamarack Resort filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy on February 20, 2008.[2]

External links

• Tamarack Resort - official site
• Ski Lifts.org - photos of Tamarack Resort's lifts
• SKI Magazine - "Tamarack Resort," by Christopher Solomon, October 2005, p. 82-86
• Idaho Ski Resorts.com - Tamarack Resort
• Idaho Winter.org - official state tourism site
• Cascade Dam: 1948 - (Cascade Reservoir): N.Fork Payette River, Bureau of Reclamation
• Terraserver-USA.com - USGS topo map & aerial photo
• President Bush's visit - The Idaho Statesman 25-Aug-2005
• Tamarack Resort press release - Agassi/Graf development
• USDOJ Proposed Consent Decree, storm water discharges - Federal Register: January 31, 2008 (Volume 73, Number 21), Page 5872
• Boise Guradian.com - "Tamarack: not our fault" - 21-Feb-2008