There have never been more billionaires in the world—3,028, by Forbes’ count, crossing the 3,000 threshold for the first time in 2025. It stands to reason that there also have never been more billionaires in Aspen, their collective influence shaping the community’s social fabric.
Tag: Data Desk
Stories carrying the Data Desk tag were either produced directly by the Aspen Journalism Data Desk, led by Laurine Lassalle, or benefitted from the assistance of our Data Desk. This often takes the form of data analysis to aid in reporting, creating data visualizations, maps or other graphics, or research into data sets and/or public records.
Posted inWater
Aspen reaffirms plans for new reservoirs with water court filings
Besides the five previously identified sites where the city might want to move its potential water storage, officials had been seeking to add five new reservoir sites to the change case, but ultimately they did not include them.
Posted inWater
Plan to reopen irrigation ditch has creek’s neighbors on edge
The issue of who can use water on Canyon Creek gets at a central tension of Western water law: Is water a public resource or a private property right? The answer is both.
Posted inEnvironment
Once in doubt, the E175 will fly to Aspen this summer
Tomcich told Aspen Journalism via email that he would be surprised if the E175 does not face weight restrictions during the summer months — just as nearly all aircraft, including the CRJ700, do in the summer at ASE.
Posted inWater
North/south split for Western Slope snowpack and streamflow forecasts
Some recent data has shown a north/south split in streamflow declines, with rivers in the southern half of the upper Colorado River basin losing a larger percentage of flows in the first two decades of the 21st century than rivers in the northern part of the basin.
Posted inWater
Dwindling water supply, legal questions push Colorado River into ‘wildly uncharted territory’
Although the phrase often looms like a threat over Colorado River discussions, there is no agreed-upon definition of the term, what would trigger a compact call nor how one would play out.
Posted inSocial justice
COVID-19 was ‘the great accelerator.’ Its impacts are still rippling out.
“It’s convenient for people not to think about the pandemic, and sometimes you sound like a bit of an oddball when you talk about it,” said Katherine Sand, director of the resource center Aspen Family Connections. “But I think it’s a defining moment in our lives.”
Posted inEnvironment
AI vehicle counters to provide better input on upper valley traffic flows
Each counter has a camera, operating 24/7, that captures both directions of traffic and an AI-processing unit that translates the video into data. This system is capable of counting the number of vehicles passing by and can distinguish vehicle types based on the Federal Highway Administration’s 13 vehicle category classifications.
Posted inWater
Upper Basin water managers want monthly drought meetings with feds
This is a critical time for Colorado River management as the Upper Basin states are in talks with the Lower Basin states (California, Arizona, Nevada) about how the nation’s two largest reservoirs, Lake Powell and Lake Mead, will be operated and cuts will be shared after 2026 when the current guidelines expire.
Posted inEnvironment
Pitkin County proposes land exchange with feds to gain ownership of Wildwood property
Some neighbors aren’t convinced the county should own the property and have called for limitations on public use, a management tool county staff has said they can only explore once they have authority and own the land at the Wildwood put-in.