Every Tuesday, I feature my favorite Instagram photos from around the lift world.
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Skyliner Update: Hiring Begins, Ropes Soon?
Walt Disney World Resort’s Skyliner is beginning to look a lot like a gondola – actually a system of gondolas unlike anything ever built in North America. Before I get to construction pictures, two significant developments occurred within the past week. First, Disney Parks announced that water taxi service between certain destinations will be suspended for 21 days beginning November 28th, likely so haul ropes and communications lines can be pulled between the eight gondola stations and 50 or so towers. Second, the first Skyliner-specific job posting appeared last Thursday. More on that in a minute.
The station at Epcot International Gateway is getting close and scaffolding shown below may be for applying the graphics shown in this artist’s rendering. The rear end of the terminal is getting a steel structure over the turnaround area where guests will load and unload.
The non-boarding station to the southwest of Epcot now looks similarly complete. Some of the D-Line windows are transparent while some are opaque, breaking up visually this very long station. Unfortunately the three awesome red bullwheels are being covered with terminal skin as well. Notice the stub rails on both sides which will ensure no cabin is ever more than two stations away from somewhere it can be removed. The primary parking and maintenance bays will be at Caribbean Beach South, two stops away from this angle change. The Epcot line has a total of four stations.
News Roundup: Coast to Coast
- Alyeska sells to a Canadian hotel company.
- Rockland Estate, the new adventure park in St. Maarten anchored by two Skytracs, wins Innovative Shore Excursion of the Year at the cruise industry’s global trade conference.
- Alterra moves to replace Squaw’s Red Dog with a six-pack in a new alignment to make room for the proposed California Express.
- Edmonton’s urban gondola concept has a team and a name: Prairie Sky.
- A $75,000 study of San Diego concludes a gondola could attract 1.1 to 1.6 million passengers annually.
- Bloomberg asks independent ski areas a question: Are Epic and Ikon counterproductive to growing skiing?
- Bogotá takes the urban gondola plunge with TransMiCable by Doppelmayr.
- I can think of a few ski areas which would benefit from a mining company gifting three new lifts, as happened at Smokey Mountain.
- Attitash retires the Top Notch double after 50 years of service.
- New lifts mean new trail maps for Sun Peaks, Mt. Spokane and Loveland.
- A Snowdon Six Express photo update from Killington:
CWA and Doppelmayr Introduce Omega V
On the heels of building its 50,000th Omega gondola cabin, CWA Constructions introduced the fifth generation of an icon yesterday. Omega V features updated design language and is highly customizable for monocable gondola installations going forward. Omega first debuted back in 1983 and the the rest is history. The Omega IV joined the dynasty in 2007 and in just a dozen years became the chosen carrier for 29 gondolas in the United States and Canada. “The new cabin features the unmistakable Omega shape which merges seamlessly with any of its surroundings. The cabin has been completely redeveloped while retaining the core values of a true Omega,” Doppelmayr says.
Designed with 10 passenger D-Line systems in mind, The V will become the global standard for snow, tourism and urban installations by the Doppelmayr Garaventa Group, of which CWA is a member. The changes I noticed first were the suspension going below the roof line and the bench seats being swapped for individual places (each seat is 18.1 inches or 460 mm wide, more than you’ll find in a typical economy airline seat.) The V has new ergonomic ski rack choices, two bumper options and wider doors that open to 35 inches (900 mm.) A single door can hold up to six pairs of powder skis or five with a snowboard lot. An interior bike rack is also available.
Instagram Tuesday: Seasons Change
Every Tuesday, I feature my favorite Instagram photos from around the lift world.
Sipapu Looks to Add Lifts & Terrain
Sipapu Ski & Summer Resort has submitted a master plan amendment to the Forest Service seeking to expand by 924 acres while adding 51 new trails, four new lifts, a mountain coaster and more. This should come as no surprise given the resort’s history, current layout and owner – the collective of southwestern ski resorts known as Mountain Capital Partners. Like with the resort’s accepted 2012 master plan, Sipapu continues to envision two new base-to-summit lifts. Today, it takes two fixed-grip lift rides to reach 9,295′, well below the actual summit of the mountain.
A mile-plus long Sipapu Express would rise from the current base area to a new beginner learning zone at nearly 9,700 feet with a second chairlift and two carpets. Because it would operate in both winter and summer for a variety of guests, the Sipapu Express is proposed as a chair/gondola combination lift. Mountain Capital Partners and its managing partner, James Coleman, plan to build a similar lift at Arizona Snowbowl as soon as next summer. A second detachable lift at Sipapu, the Westside Express, would service intermediate terrain in an entirely new pod beyond the current permit area. “This lift will provide access to the abundant intermediate fall line skiing terrain that has been identified to address the deficiency of intermediate terrain within the existing SUP Area,” the plan notes. This one would be around 4,400 feet long with a capacity of 2,400 skiers per hour. The plan would also see Lift 1 realigned and replaced with a ift capable of moving 2,400 skiers per hour. Lift 3, one of the last remaining high-speed Pomas in the country, is unfortunately slated for removal without replacement.
News Roundup: Next Generation
- The above $52 million masterpiece and highest-ever 3S opens for business in the shadow of the Matterhorn.
- The Leitner-Poma Group’s sixth tricable gondola is set to carry commuters between three stations in Toulouse, France from 2020 and will cost $94.5 million to build.
- Alterra closes on its purchase of Crystal Mountain.
- A lift operator and his employer, Killingon/Pico, are sued following a loading mishap.
- An eighth urban gondola line opens in La Paz and carries 72,740 riders on its first day.
- CWA teases Omega V, the next evolution of the world’s best selling gondola cabin. While we wait to see what it looks like, check out hundreds of CWA designs from the past 75 years.
- The Palm Springs Tram gets a new 13,500′ x 45 mm upper haul rope from Fatzer. Thanks Kirk D. for the photos.
- Horseshoe Resort’s retired 1989 Doppelmayr detachable quad hits the used market.
- Whistler Blackcomb’s 2018-19 trail map shows what $52 million worth of new lifts looks like.
- Read up on Sun Peaks’ new Orient quad here.
- Lone Mountain Land Company eyes two more lifts on the Spanish Peaks side of Big Sky Resort and nine in Moonlight Basin.
- Revelstoke’s newspaper looks into rumors of a gondola project on Mt. Begbie.
- The City of Los Angeles will study two Hollywood gondola ideas.
- Another Disney Skyliner station is nearly finished with tons of windows.
- Windham names its new lift Westside Six. I stopped by last week to check out the progress.
Instagram Tuesday: Coming Soon
Every Tuesday, I feature my favorite Instagram photos from around the lift world.
Pioneering Ramcharger 8 Takes Flight
The most state-of-the-art chairlift in the world went vertical today under wispy Montana skies. Teams from Doppelmayr, Big Sky Resort and Timberline Helicopters flawlessly executed 71 trips to hundreds of thousands of pounds of steel to Andesite Mountain in under six and a half hours. Thanks to good weather and an even better crew, that’s an average of one pick every 5.5 minutes, including refueling. As fly days go, it was amazing to watch Ramcharger 8 take shape.
News Roundup: Down to the Wire
- Beaver Creek renames the Buckaroo Express gondola Haymeadow Express, the name of the double chair which ran in the same alignment from 1980 to 2007.
- Whether the Hermitage Club closes a $30 million loan to catch up on lift maintenance and operate this winter is still an open question.
- Arapahoe Basin and Leitner-Poma fly steel for the Beavers project.
- As of yesterday, Vail Resorts officially operates Okemo, Mt. Sunapee and Crested Butte.
- Vail reports fiscal 2018 resort EBITDA was $616.6 million, an increase of 3.9 percent over the prior year. 2018-19 season pass sales are up 25 percent in units and 15 percent in dollars as of Sunday.
- West Mountain adds a million dollar chairlift and looks to build another.
- A New York-based developer receives one of many approvals for Mayflower Village at Deer Valley, which could eventually mean a slate of new lifts.
- Doppelmayr is named in connection with an urban gondola eyed for Long Beach, California.
- Watch a remarkable 3S gondola launch live from Zermatt at 9:15 Eastern tomorrow morning, 6:15 Pacific.
- The CFO and COO of Peak Resorts open up about their decision to buy Snow Time and note the three new mountains don’t immediately need much capital investment.
- The longtime owners of Great Divide, Montana plan to sell to another couple next year.
- Legendary ski resort builder Les Otten remains committed to The Balsams but laments, “time is killing this project.”
- Mountain Capital Partners releases more details on the Spider Mountain Bike Park project.
- The damaged Zugspitze cabin is successfully lowered to the valley for disassembly. The cable car’s operator says damage exceeds $1.2 million and the lift could reopen by year end.
- Boreal names its new quad California Cruiser.
- The latest Leitner-Poma six-pack at Hunter Mountain, seen below, will be called Northern Express.
