Aspen Journalism is compiling a data dashboard highlighting metrics of local public interest, updated weekly. Snowpack at McClure Pass gets below 4 inches of snow-water equivalent. Snowpack in the Roaring Fork basin is dropping as temperatures are going up. Snowpack went from 14.8 inches of snow-water equivalent per site on...

Editor’s note: This is the first story in a two-part series from Aspen Journalism about the management of the North Star Nature Preserve east of Aspen. This story examines a potential land exchange that could be complicated by a mining claim, while the second story looks at past management, recent studies and what’s next for North Star.

Editor’s note: This is the second story in a two-part series from Aspen Journalism about the management of the North Star Nature Preserve east of Aspen. This first story examined a potential land exchange that could be complicated by a mining claim, and this story looks at past management, recent studies and what’s next for North Star.

Aspen Journalism is compiling a data dashboard highlighting metrics of local public interest, updated weekly. Snowpack in the Roaring Fork basin is dropping as temperatures are going up. Snowpack went from 16.4 inches of snow-water equivalent per site on April 14 to 14.8 inches on April 21, or 103% of median, according to NRCS.

“Some of these towns have tried to create a place that has character, but when you take out the characters, it just feels plastic.”. The massive Grand Avenue Bridge that sweeps over the Colorado River in Glenwood Springs represents an ironic response to the affordable housing crisis facing the Roaring Fork Valley.

Pitkin County has the third-highest per-capita personal income in the United States, behind Teton County, Wyoming, and Summit County, Utah, thanks to high-income earners making money off investments and remote jobs, and rising local wages. Data also shows a widening gap between per-capita personal income, which includes all sources, and...

State lawmakers are considering a bill that would let two energy companies with coal-fired power plants in northwest Colorado hang on to their water rights even after the plants’ planned closures in 2028. Senate Bill 197 says that industrial water rights held by Xcel Energy and Tri-State Generation and...

Aspen Journalism is compiling a data dashboard highlighting metrics of local public interest, updated weekly. More rooms booked but overall occupancy down this winter. Paid occupancy in Aspen reached 73.5% in March, down from 77.8% last year. Snowmass recorded 72.7% paid occupancy, down from 2023’s 73.8%, according to the March 2024 occupancy report for Aspen and Snowmass lodges, compiled by local tourism officials and reservations tracking firm Destimetrics. March occupancy reached 73.1% for the two towns combined this year, down from 75.8% last year.

The month of March in Colorado was wet, with several storms bumping snowpack and spring runoff forecasts to above average across nearly all of the state. That is the main take-away from the April 2024 Water Supply Outlook Report from the National Resources Conservation Service and good news for those who depend on water from the drought-plagued Colorado River basin.

Aspen Journalism is compiling a data dashboard highlighting metrics of local public interest, updated weekly. Snowpack in the Roaring Fork basin reached an average of 17.9 inches of snow-water equivalent per site on April 7, or 113% of median. That’s up from 17.7 inches on March 31 but down from 114% of median, according to NRCS.

Aspen Journalism is compiling a data dashboard highlighting metrics of local public interest, updated weekly. Snowpack in the Roaring Fork basin is up after recent snowstorms as it reached an average of 17.7 inches of snow-water equivalent per site on March 31, or 114% of median. That’s up from 16 inches on March 24 and 107% of median, according to NRCS.

Colorado state Rep. Tammy Story stepped into the world of gray wolves during last year’s legislative session when Western Slope lawmakers pushed forward Senate Bill 256, a bill potentially delaying wolf reintroduction if a federal plan was not finalized that would allow lethal control of wolves that preyed on livestock.

After a year’s worth of work and meetings with a facilitator, a group focused on protecting the Crystal River is pursuing three potential ways forward. The Crystal River Wild & Scenic and Other Alternatives Feasibility Collaborative Steering Committee recommends forming three subcommittees, each focused on continuing to evaluate a different method of river protection.

Aspen Journalism is compiling a data dashboard highlighting metrics of local public interest, updated weekly. Snowpack at Schofield Pass reaches 29 inches of snow-water equivalent. Snowpack in the Roaring Fork basin reached an average of 16 inches of snow-water equivalent per site on March 24, or 107% of median. That’s...

“When you have people living in your community, spending in your community, involved in your community, the community can thrive.”. — Alicia Gresley, Colorado River Valley Economic Development Partnership. As workers from the Aspen community have incrementally been pushed downvalley over the decades by a tsunami of surging real estate...

Aspen Journalism is compiling a data dashboard highlighting metrics of local public interest, updated weekly. Paid occupancy in Aspen reached 77.5% in February, down from 79% last year. Snowmass recorded 74.3% paid occupancy, down from 2023’s 74.9%, according to the February 2024 occupancy report for Aspen and Snowmass lodges, compiled by local tourism officials and reservations tracking firm Destimetrics. February occupancy reached 75.9% for the two towns combined this year, down from 76.9% last year.

As a shy and bearded young architecture student at the University of Southern California in the spring of 1970, Gary Anderson happened upon a flyer advertising a graphic-design contest. It called for students to create a symbol to promote the recycling of paper products, with a winner to be selected at that summer’s International Design Conference at Aspen.

Aspen Journalism is compiling a data dashboard highlighting metrics of local public interest, updated weekly. Snowpack in the Roaring Fork basin reached an average of 15.1 inches of snow-water equivalent per site on March 10, or 109% of median after last week’s storm. That’s up from 13.4 inches on March 3 and from 100% of median, according to NRCS.

Beginning high in the Elk Mountains, the Crystal River flows 40 miles through three counties, cutting a canyon under the flanks of Mount Sopris and winding past the towns of Marble, Redstone and Carbondale before joining with the Roaring Fork River. Along the way, its waters turn mesa hayfields, acres of alfalfa and Carbondale parks and lawns a verdant green.

In 2012, one of the driest years in Colorado in recent memory, the Crystal River practically dried up. Ken Neubecker, a now-retired Colorado projects director at environmental group American Rivers and former member of the Pitkin County Healthy Rivers board, recalls the stream conditions. “I took a photo on the...