Lift Blog

When Loon Mountain in New Hampshire’s White Mountains designed their South Peak expansion a decade ago, they needed a way to move skiers between Loon Peak and South Peak over terrain too flat to ski.  Doppelmayr CTEC engineered the Tote Road quad, a two-way chairlift to transport skiers between the mountains.  This was a cheaper solution than building heavily-graded ski trails or a detachable gondola.

The drive terminal was sited along the Upper Bear Claw trail near the summit of Loon.  After loading here, the lift rises sharply to allow skiers coming from the other direction to cross underneath.  Tote Road descends modestly before climbing to the summit of South Peak.  The return terminal is located adjacent to the top of the Lincoln Express which also opened for the 2007-2008 season.  On the return trip from South Peak, skiers unload at a ramp well before the drive terminal but still close enough for the loading and unloading ramps to share one set of controls and a single lift shack.  To my knowledge, each end of Tote Road is always staffed by two operators even though Loon could theoretically get away with just one.

Tote Road has 11 towers; the first three are split towers with different heights on each side. Its 89 chairs move 2,400 skiers per hour in each direction at 450 feet a minute.  Because the lift goes down before it goes up, the vertical distance between terminals is only 95 feet.  Slope length is just under 2,000 feet with a ride time of 4.3 minutes each way.  By these numbers, Tote Rode is a small lift but it is a very important link at one of the most visited resorts in the East.

South Peak at Loon Mountain now has three lifts (all built by Doppelmayr CTEC) with two more on the way in a proposed beginner complex.  Right now Loon is for sale along with the dozen other resorts owned by CNL Lifestyle Properties so it may be awhile before we see more new lifts here.