I was waiting to post my will attend until I was sure I will attend.  Then I read the announcement about hoping it would warm up.  But even some warmth probably wouldn’t make enough of a dent.  I think a souvenir is nice, but many people did many a CITO before souvenirs and likely would still come.  But like you, my May is pretty busy.  We used to do the highway clean-up twice a year and attendance was higher in the spring than it was in the fall.  You make good points, and I’m sorry I don’t have any strong advice for you.  I guess my vote would be for 4/28, but I don’t know how much melting would happen.  One extended forecast I looked at has highs in the 50s all that week prior and 60s for the 28th…but info is less reliable that far out.

I’m not too concerned about the souvenir, there will probably be other CITO’s to get the souvenir, and if not no biggie.  Unfortunately I can’t say that any weekend further out would work better.  Work keeps threatening to work weekends, and being that I’ve only been there since December, I can’t bail too much on them.  I do think we’ll get some warm weather, this next week, I suspect it will diminish the snow greatly possibly completely, but everything will be a mud bath out there.  I know there were some concerns about damaging the surrounding foliage.  In the end I don’t have much advice for you.  In the end, someone will have to pick a date and hopefully it works for everyone.  I truly hope its a weekend I can be available, the idea of dragging heavy metal up a hill just sounds like an awesome adventure, regardless of how much work it is.  Of your 4 options, the fourth might just be the best…