A feasibility study is getting underway next month to see if some Midwest developers will bring the Two Elks Lodge to Whitefish. Two Elks would be a 150-room upscale hotel built in the Glacier Park style with 150 rooms, a conference center that could house 1,500 people, a year-round indoor ice-skating rink, a 45,000 square foot indoor waterpark, and a retail shopping plaza. Whitefish is being considered largely because the unnamed Midwestern developer used to be a part-time resident there, and he's even planning on dedicating the place in her honor, as she requested the lodge be built in Whitefish before tragically dying of cancer.
While no potential locations have been made public, the town has been searching for a way to get a large-scale convention center built in order to bring in large groups. Logistics are still a concern though, as the number of flights coming in daily to Glacier Park International is still small when compared with the traffic that would be needed to fill a 1,500-strong banquet hall. The bigger question would be what is up with the trend of building giant waterparks in ski towns, which would seem to offer up every kind of nature-based diversion a waterpark could ever hope to satisfy. Disagree? Comment it up!
· Whitefish eyed as possible home for $70M resort [Whitefish Pilot]