For the week of May 7 - 13, 2003

Elkhorn Resort
finding new life

Much of hotel, restaurants recycled, reused

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By GREGORY FOLEY
Express Staff Writer

Despite being reduced to rubble in recent weeks, Elkhorn Resort is finding new life among a series of other projects in Idaho and beyond.

During the demolition of the 132-unit hotel in March and April, several tons of the resort’s materials were salvaged for reuse or recycling.

Work crews last winter salvaged an abundant amount of materials from Elkhorn Resort, including parts of the roof of the River Rock Steak House building on the north side of Elkhorn Village, top photo. On Tuesday, workers for demolition contractor Twin Falls Crane Service put the finishing touches on their project by adding fill and soil to the site of the former Elkhorn Hotel, bottom photo. Express photos by Willy Cook

Jim Thorpe, owner of Twin Falls Crane Service, the company that conducted the project, said that although some 6,000 tons of building debris was trucked to a regional landfill, a significant amount of the Elkhorn Hotel, River Rock Steak House and Treat Haus buildings was salvaged.

Thorpe kicked off a sale of a portion of the salvaged materials on Saturday in southern Twin Falls at the old Norco window factory.

The salvage sale is scheduled to continue daily through mid-May, but could terminate sooner if all of the materials are sold.

"It’s going really well," he said. "We’re about half sold (out) in three days."

Thorpe said numerous buyers at the sale over the weekend traveled to Twin Falls from various cities in Blaine County, southern Idaho and Nevada.

Items offered in the sale include windows, furniture, carpeting, dishes and doors from the defunct resort’s buildings.

Overall, approximately 3,000 tons of wood debris and an equal amount of concrete debris were unable to be recycled, Thorpe noted.

However, most other materials were separated for reuse. All told, more than 10 tons of copper, steel and aluminum were recycled. Among the items kept for reuse were 291 tons of wood beams, 6,210 tons of steel beams, 4,600 square feet of plywood, 110 doors, six tons of river rock and 25,000 paver pieces. Also salvaged were the buildings’ elevators, floor tiles and rafters.

Thorpe said the demolition essentially went as planned. "The only glitch in the whole job was the rain during the last two or three weeks."

Of 65 trees slated for removal as part of the project, only one was taken out, he added.

Thorpe said crews this week would install 5,500 tons of gravel backfill at the site. After the fill is in place, crews will add approximately 1,700 tons of topsoil from the Wood River High School construction site in Hailey, he noted.

Once the site is filled in and graded, a separate contractor will begin landscape work on the property, Thorpe said.

The owner of the property, CG-Elkhorn, is preparing an application to redevelop the property with a mix of residences and commercial spaces.

 

The Idaho Mountain Express is distributed free to residents and guests throughout the Sun Valley, Idaho resort area community. Subscribers to the Idaho Mountain Express will read these stories and others in this week's issue.