For the week of November 4 thru November 10, 1998  

Summer Hailey shuttle won’t extend to winter run


By ALYSON WILSON
Express Staff Writer

Cold weather and the first few snowflakes mean ski season is right down the road, but Hailey residents shouldn’t expect a shuttle to be waiting to take them to Baldy.

"Running a shuttle never works in the winter," owner of Bald Mountain Taxi Chris Simpson said last week.

The taxi company ran a smashingly successful summer shuttle service last season—between Sturtevant’s Hailey and Ketchum stores--but Simpson said running a ski shuttle operation is a totally different matter.

"The kids take it in the summer when they’re not in school, but in the winter, I guess people just like to take their own cars," Simpson said.

Simpson said it was a waste of the company’s resources to have drivers show up for often-empty runs scheduled all winter long, or even only on winter weekend days.

Bald Mountain Taxi has tried twice before to operate a north-south ski shuttle to limited success, and Simpson said he has just about tired of trying to figure out how to make one function effectively.

"We’ve tried surveys. We’ve tried flyers. I’d love to do it, but it doesn’t work," he said.

A dispatcher at A-1 Taxi and Ketchum Area Rapid Transit manager Terry Crawford both confirmed that neither operation will run a shuttle route this winter to Hailey.

If interest heightens for some reason, though, Simpson said he’ll give the whole thing a second thought.

"We’d love to start something again," he said.

 

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