Former Superfund Site To Become Resort

PARK CITY, UT-A 16-acre piece of a former mining property here is slated for a luxury spa and resort. The developer, DV Luxury Resorts, has leased the site long-term from property owner United Park City Mines.

The development, which has received approval, is being called Montage Resort and Spa.Construction on the resort’s 178 hotel rooms and 94 resort residences is scheduled to begin this summer. DV Luxury Resorts expects the property to qualify for a Silver rating from the US Green Building Council’s Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design program. Completion is expected in 2010.

The law firm Chapman and Cutler LLC advised United Park City Mines in the transaction and in its clean-up and conversion efforts. Law firm partner Kevin Murray says the transformation of the Daly West Mine could be a working model for successful redevelopment of other troubled real estate assets throughout the western US, including some 14,000 abandoned mining sites in Utah, Colorado, Wyoming, Idaho, Montana, the Dakotas and Alaska. “There’s gold in them thar hills after all and it’s called sustainable development for recreation and tourism,” Murray says.

United Park City Mines, which owns the site, has been working since 1997 on a comprehensive redevelopment plan for hundreds of surrounding acres of property. Kerry Gee, vice president of United Park City Mines, says mining site redevelopments are not a new thing in Park City. In the 1960′s, when mining was a declining industry here, United Park and the Park City community created a ski resort on the mountains where only mining operations previously existed.

To help facilitate the hotel project, the federal EPA and the Department of Justice agreed to provide DV Luxury Resort with liability relief in exchange for the company’s commitment to develop the resort complex in an environmentally-sensitive manner. Under the EPA program, DV Luxury Resort will incorporate extensive green features into the design, construction and operation of the development to minimize the project’s environmental footprint. Green features will include a 750-block wind energy purchase through Utah’s Blue Sky partnership, a 2,800-acre open space easement, use of native vegetation, a constructed wetland and groundwater treatment system and the use of chlorine alternatives for resort pools and spas.