The Valles Caldera National Preserve will issue a business model today, according to a story in today’s Santa Fe New Mexican. The model assumes that visitation to the Preserve will “plateau at about 120,000 people a year,” compared with 15,000 visitors last year, and compared with 220,000 annual visitors at neighboring Bandelier National Monument.
The model, prepared by ENTRIX, a nationwide environmental consulting firm, also proposes two alternative paths toward financial self-sustainability. One, which would include a “luxury hunting lodge and a medium-priced lodge with a restaurant,” would enable the Preserve to reach profitability in six years. The second, which would forego lodging, would allow the Preserve to move into the black in seven years through “camping fees, recreational activities, gift store sales, donations and a livestock grazing program.”
However, building a visitor center and gift shop remains a higher priority than these two possibilities, according to the New Mexican.
Read the story in the Santa Fe New Mexican here.
Read the accompanying sidebar for this story, which breaks down the financial figures in this business model.
UPDATE: April 8, 2009: The Los Alamos Monitor also ran a story about this announcement. A noteworthy quote from this story comes from Valles Caldera Trust Vice Chair Ed Tinsley, who mentions that the aforementioned “medium-priced lodge” might charge $210 per day (instead of $150 per day, a price that would be sustainable if a “green burial” service could be implemented on the Preserve). Read that story here.
