CB-Telluride Parking Marathon Slated

(Crested Butte, CO — Park Tomorrow For Tonight — March 22, 2016)

The long awaited Crested Butte-Telluride Winter Parking Marathon is just a few days away with over 1000 contestants still trying to qualify for the final heat and the big payoff.

Already three persons are a lock here with two spots still up for grabs on the San Miguel County team.

The Marathon, donned The Park-Off by local participants, will pit the finest parallel parkers in the land in a three-day, non-stop parking competition. Here’s how she works:

Day One: Telluride drivers will be airlifted above Mt. Crested Butte where they will descend via parachute to Riverbend (just south of CB) far below. Immediately upon touch down surviving participants will scurry to their vehicles and begin looking for a place to park on Elk Avenue. Sanctioned areas include the main street as well as the first blocks of 2nd and 3rd Streets.

Simultaneously the drivers from Crested Butte will be whisked into Telluride by limo. The objective here is a duplication of the action in Gunnison County. Colorado Avenue, Fir Street and Pine are all designed as Official Parking Zones. Meters and many bothersome street people have been pulled for the event.

“While we realize that the three-day time limit could be seen as stringent but we can’t tie up traffic for more than the weekend in either locale,” said former Telluride resident Randy Sublett, “but one must remember that these are some of the best parkers in the world.”

“Our people are primed for this,” said Mark Reaman, Sublett’s counterpart in Crested Butte. “We have even replaced doors with hood ornaments for better visibility.”

The rules are simple yet confining: No saving parking spaces and no collisions with other cars. Persons who hog two spaces will be disqualified. Idling is illegal. Cutting of flatlanders is OK. Parking in bus or fire zone is OK unless one is caught.

Last year the slopes were all but empty during the Parking Marathon lending credence to beliefs that the public is ready for a more varied approach to spectator sports and that diversification could be the panacea to the fumbling ski industry.

– Fred Zeppelin