Strawberry Bowl and Ridge
Until 1997, Strawberry Bowl was the crown jewel of the Burch Creek Roadless Area: a pristine alpine basin at 9000 feet elevation. But the Snowbasin Land Exchange Act authorized the expansion of the ski area into Strawberry Bowl, without environmental review or public input. A gravel maintenance road now switchbacks up the bowl and along the ridge to the summit of a new gondola lift. The dominant life form in the bowl is now the snow-spitting giraffe (of which more than 500 now populate the ski area).
Even though Strawberry Bowl lies more than a mile away from the Olympic ski runs, the Snowbasin Land Exchange Act states that these developments are "reasonable and necessary to accommodate the 2002 Olympics."
After the Land Exchange Act was passed, Earl Holding decided that he also wanted to build a restaurant at the lift summit on Strawberry Ridge. The Forest Service immediately approved this request without NEPA review, reasoning that although the restaurant was not needed for the Olympics, neither were any of the other developments in Strawberry Bowl that had been authorized by the Act. Excavation and construction of the restaurant proceeded, only to be stopped abruptly when Holding changed his mind and decided not to build the restaurant after all. (The photo above shows the foundation of the aborted restaurant, adjacent to the lift terminal.)
