It may come as a shock to Americans raised in suburbia, but there are housing types between single family units and skyscrapers that are very human-scale and attractive. Look at pretty much any mountain town in Europe.
we're trying to preserve these national treasures, but at the same time, choose winners as to who gets to build there...
I'd hate to see towers pop up in Vail and Breck to be honest.. the charm is what it is - the log cabins and resorts that disappear in the mountains.
edit: having been a ski bum in Vail, I can't say that I've visited every resort in CO. But across Vail, Breck, Keystone, A Basin, Loveland, Monarch, Cooper, Copper, Beaver Creek, Steamboat, Wolf Creek, Crested Butte, all 5 mountains of Aspen, there are no 10+ story towers. I'm trying to take back some of the pedantic tone of my original comment.
Overall point here is that Vail and other ski resort towns happily build very large buildings for vacationers and second home owners. I just don’t buy that having very large office and residential buildings would have that much greater of an environmental, or even quality of life, impact.