Our Vision #16: Tramway, Zipline, Waterslide

Productive mines are often discovered in inaccessible terrain. For many mining operations like the Ute Ulay, it was not cost-effective to build and maintain roads for several burros or pack horses to transport ore down the mountain. Aerial tramways developed in the 1860s transformed the mining industry. This creative solution inspired us to imagine reinstating the Ute Ulay tramway. 

Ute Ulay adventure loop

In our vision, a low-energy, small tramcar would carry two people up the slope. At the top, visitors would have the choice to ride the tram down or take a zipline to the inoperative Ute Ulay dam. If the flume were also reinstated, one could waterslide back to the mill site, completing the Ute Ulay loop adventure.

Our Vision #6: Early Art Integration [2/4]

Structure Splinting

There are two frame structures on the Ute Ulay site in need of immediate repair, the head frame and the remains of the flume head at the former mill site. Both of these historical fragments communicate how the mine worked at the height of its productive life. 

historic structure splinting

In medical parlance, bone fractures can be held together using internal and external orthopedic metal splints. If we consider the frame structures as skeletons of the industrial past, an aesthetic sculptural component of the remediation process could be making visible methods of repair.