For the week of June 24 thru June 30, 1998  

New resort proposed in Warm Springs


By KATHRYN BEAUMONT
Express Staff Writer

Imagine arriving at Friedman Memorial Airport for a ski vacation with only a carry-on bag in your hand.

You are picked up by a private taxi, whisked into Ketchum and dropped off at your condo at the base of the lifts (where your skis are already stored), ready to take a sauna in your private health club.

A company called Star Resorts wants to make this happen in Warm Springs. The Park City, Utah-based developers have proposed a 23-unit residential-hotel appropriately named the Warm Springs Club.

The proposal calls for 16 time-share condominiums, seven hotel units, a health club and underground parking to be constructed on a portion of the Janssen lot on Skiway Drive between Howard and Ritchie drives.

Bill Orwig, a Ketchum resident and membership director for Star Resorts, said the Warm Springs Club is one of 20 to 30 such clubs the company plans to build over the next four years in ski areas and warm weather destinations. Star Resorts already owns clubs in Deer Valley, Steamboat and Northstar in Lake Tahoe.

Besides an onsite health club for members and guests, Orwig said the point of the project is to provide a "hassle-free vacation experience," complete with transportation to and from the airport and town.

"Rather than paying $1 million for a condo, members own the whole thing," Orwig said. "It doesn’t make sense to pay that much if you’re only going to be there a couple of weeks out of the year."

Condominium units at the Warm Springs Club will have three to four bedrooms and will range in price from $150,000 to $200,000, Orwig said.

The seven hotel units will have an almost identical design to the condos. By meeting the design requirements for a hotel, including a lobby and parking, Star Resorts can build more units on the property.

Orwig hopes to break ground on the project this fall and have the units occupied by the 1999-2000 ski season.

First, however, the project must pass design review, which could prove to be a little difficult. Land-use consultant Bethann Skamser showed preliminary plans to the Ketchum P&Z on Monday for preapplication design review, only to have them quickly rejected.

Expressing concern that the project didn’t fit in with the atmosphere of the rest of the Warm Springs Base area, the P&Z suggested a softer, more accommodating design than the two, three-story, blockish, flat-roofed buildings presented by Skamser.

"It kind of looks like a Howard Johnson’s with some stone on it," said P&Z member Rod Sievers.

Skamser quickly produced an alternate design, which the P&Z most likely will discuss at the end of July.

 

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