Climbing Pikes Peak is sublime. Whether by road or trail or train, the way clambers up and up through ancient forests until the pines break on a wind-driven tundra. Still the climb goes on, above the clouds, along the jagged crests of billion-year-old granite, past trotting herds of bighorn sheep, through gardens of tiny alpine flowers as tough as time.

1. Colorado Springs poised to upgrade Pikes
Peak summit house after years of neglect
Source
Climbing Pikes Peak is sublime. Whether by road or trail or train, the way clambers up and
up through ancient forests until the pines break on a wind-driven tundra. Still the climb
goes on, above the clouds, along the jagged crests of billion-year-old granite, past trotting
herds of bighorn sheep, through gardens of tiny alpine flowers as tough as time.
It is the jewel of our region.
Then you get to the summit. And it's ... crappy.
Literally. A persistent sewer leak in the 1970s melted the permafrost, causing the summit
house to slowly sink into the ground. It's now held up by jacks. The summit's observation
deck - a popular spot for weddings - is also the roof of the septic system, and as one city
report, noted, putting it mildly, "can often have an obnoxious odor."
Most of the mountaintop is dominated by a parking lot. On good days the prime parking
spot is occupied by a garbage truck. On bad days, there is also a sewage truck.
The summit house, a squat, plain structure built in 1964 - not a high point in American
architecture - has almost no windows despite its 360-degree views. The ceilings leak. The
foundation is failing. It is so structurally suspect that in the past it has been condemned.
"It looks like a cross between the single nastiest roadside gift shop you can imagine and the
Fuhrer's bunker," said John Hazlehurst, a former City Council member who has pushed for
decades for improvements. "Pikes Peak is America's mountain but we treat it like
America's junkyard."
Scattered around the summit are even uglier metal structures erected by the Army and
Colorado Springs Utilities that prompted one visitor on Yelp.com, echoing many, to post,
"The view of natural splendor at the top is spoiled by crappy buildings that to me made the
top look like the back alley of a strip mall. Whose great idea was that?"
The city of Colorado Springs, which owns the summit house, and the U.S. Forest Service,
which oversees the land, have planned for decades to clean up the summit, but lack of
money, lawsuits and competing community priorities killed all efforts.
As the city stalled, the average annual number of visits to the peak declined 34,000 in the
past decade, compared with the 1990s.

2. Now, 20 years after the start of the last serious attempt, the city says it is finally poised to
give the summit an extreme makeover.
In coming years, the city will have money to put toward rehabbing the summit. Additional
money could come from the Army, Utilities and the state tourist funds. And, officials say, all
the involved parties are beginning to plan.
"Everyone agrees it needs to be done. The summit experience certainly could be more
pleasant," said Jack Glavan, manager of the Pikes Peak Highway, a city enterprise that owns
the summit house. "We're hoping the timing with funding and everything else is finally
right."
A commercial fourteener
A building of one kind or another has stood atop Pikes Peak since 1873 when the Army
built a two-room stone weather station to record wind and temperature data.
In 1882, as more tourists began making the trek by foot and mule, the Army added to the
building to make room for visitors. A portion of one wall still stands today by the septic
tanks.
The Army abandoned its weather station in 1888. It was taken over by the mayor of
Manitou Springs, who started selling doughnuts and coffee to tourists.
The construction of the Pikes Peak and Manitou Cog Railway in 1891, and the steady
stream of visitors it brought, ensured the peak would have a doughnut shop for generations
to come.
It was somewhere not too far from this doughnut shop in 1893 that Katharine Lee Bates
looked out from the summit over purple mountains and fruited plains and was inspired to
later write "America the Beautiful." Whether she consumed a doughnut is lost to history.
In 1900, the summit house expanded to include a two-story observation post tourists could
climb for 25 cents. In 1917, a second summit house was built on the western side of the
summit to serve the growing number of tourists coming up the newly improved auto road.
The building was destroyed by fire in 1953 when its boiler exploded, leaving only the
original summit house, which kept on churning out doughnuts until it was demolished in
1964 to make way for the current building, completed for $500,000.
Peak or pit?
The inspiration Bates encountered on Pikes Peak more than a century ago is hard to find
today.

3. The summit house is stuffed with foreign-made trinkets and crude-humored T-shirts and
junk food, but has almost no displays highlighting the peak's history and ecology. There are
no tourist-friendly trails to the best-view points. Families shuffle around in mud and
slippery gravel, past dirty hoses and a dilapidated shack with a sign that says, "caution
open pit."
There is little trash on the summit, but only because persistent winds blow it down into the
talus below where it lasts for decades.
"You look at all that and just want to cry. How can we do this? How can we sit back and let
this happen" said Hazlehurst.
The summit has been a problem for quite some time.
Recognizing the shortcomings, the city decided to redesign the top in 1995, adding trails,
overlooks, redesigning the parking lot and tearing down the failing summit house.
A local architect hired by the city designed a grand 35,000-square-foot structure in the
style of an Aspen ski lodge, complete with covered train parking and a cupola peeking from
the top. The upper floor would be lined with windows and educational exhibits. The ground
floor would be a restaurant and gift shop tied together by an ostentatious entryway.
"It was really overdue. So many people visiting the peak see it as a disappointment," said
former County Commissioner Jim Bensberg, who, with Hazlehurst, has pushed the city to
revive the project.
As the project went forward, things started to fall apart. To find the estimated $10 million
for the job, the city hired a fundraising consultant for $100,000. She was able to find only
$2,000, according to a Gazette article from 1998.
The cost estimates soared to $40 million, even as features such as the cupola were whittled
off. Still, the city pushed ahead, planning to fund the project with revenue from the Pikes
Peak Highway.
Then, in 1999, the Sierra Club sued the city, claiming gravel sluicing off the highway was
mucking up the local streams and violating the Clean Water Act. A federal judge agreed and
ordered the city to pave the road - a project that would cost millions and take a decade to
complete. "It also effectively killed any talk of the summit house - there was simply no
money left," said Jeff Hovermale, who worked on the permits for the project for the U.S.
Forest Service.
Now things are looking up. The paving is done. The $15 million project was completed in
2011.

4. With paving done, the highway can devote $500,000 to $800,000 per year toward building
the summit house, according to the city.
Bensberg and Hazlehurst gave a detailed proposal on the summit to the city in November.
"We have picked up where they left off and have begun the planning for a new facility," said
city parks director Karen Palus.
Mayor Steve Bach is "very supportive of this project," she said.
The renewed interest in the summit comes at a perfect time, said Glavan, the Pikes Peak
Highway director. Colorado Springs Utilities and the Army plan to replace their buildings
on the summit, and the Forest Service is encouraging them to merge the three into one
building and share the cost, he said,
Utilities is not opposed to the concept so long as the move makes sense, said spokesman
Steve Berry.
In the next six months, Glavin said, he hopes a task force of the stakeholders, which include
the city, Utilities, the cog railway, the Forest Service, the Army and the National Park
Service (because the summit is a national landmark) and others, will start meeting, then
permits can be granted by the Forest Service and a public process can begin to redesign the
summit.
If all goes well, construction could start in four years, Glavin said.
Don't expect an Aspen ski lodge this time.
"I think we'll be looking at something a little smaller that blends with the environment and
is more sustainable," Glavin said. "In the process we can clean up the summit, make it more
presentable."
The city still has about $1 million for design and construction left over from a federal
earmark in the 1990s, and can apply for additional money from state tourism programs, he
said.
The project will include adding trails, redesigning parking, and dealing with the sewer
smell, Glavan said.
"Its been a long time, but the stars may finally have aligned," said Hazlehurst. He said
decades of delay may ultimately be a blessing because the intervening years have brought
an increased use of sustainable design.
"I would hope if they do redo the summit, they throw the design contest open to the world
and get something really special," he said.

5. "Not showy, but something that seems to have the permanence of the mountain itself."
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Contact Dave Philipps
636-0238
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