- Did you catch a glimpse of gondolas flying during the Super Bowl? The lift is called the Bud Light Seltzer SkyView and is expected to be open around 50 event days per year at Hard Rock Stadium.
- The Bridger-Teton National Forest releases a Draft Environmental Impact Statement for Snow King with a preferred alternative including a new gondola, backside fixed grip quad and access platter or T-Bar.
- Arctaris officially owns Saddleback and plans to order at least a detachable quad.
- With its longest chairlift out of service for weeks, Arizona Snowbowl opens its summit to hiking access.
- An Austrian newspaper interviews Anton Seeber, head of the Leitner Group, about the company’s growing presence in that country and worldwide.
- Sasquatch Mountain’s access road washes out, trapping guests at the resort for days and closing the mountain for a week.
- Sioux Falls, South Dakota budgets $1.6 million for a new chairlift at Great Bear.
- Donner Ski Ranch finds success as a family business despite being surrounded by larger resorts.
- Two more individuals bid on Hermitage Club assets with an auction now scheduled for March 20th.
- Bartholet and MND Group/LST Ropeways expand their ropeway partnership to include unified sales, service, production and products.
- The Australian resort hit hardest by this year’s wildfires won’t open next season.
- Wynn Resorts considers building a gondola from a casino in Everett, Massachusetts to a nearby transit station.
- Loon Mountain GM Jay Scambio talks extensively about Kanc 8 and Flight Path 2030.
- Keystone plans to remove Argentine as part of the Peru Express replacement project.
- New Hampshire’s largest newspaper visits Cannon Mountain and highlights the lift maintenance profession.
- A lift operator born deaf blazes trail for people with disabilities at Breckenridge.
- Struggling White Pine, Wyoming goes up for sale.
- A small Minnesota ski area closes due to chairlift problems but another local resort steps in to help.
- Three different lifts are under construction this winter in Alaska including one at the new Skeetawk ski area.
Lift Blog 
What will happen with no Argentine replacement?
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Argentine isn’t needed. It rarely runs. A new Peru Express 6-person detachable is all that is needed in that area now. Current Peru Express is 30 years old now and overdue for replacement. it is often used for night skiing and has 45,000 hours on it according to the PDF file, which they say is equivalent to 45 years of use of a normal lift (without night ops) So it’s definitely time.
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I think Keystone wants to use the Argentine base for new development.
Though it does raise the fact that without it, there won’t be a way out of Mountain House base if the new Peru Express goes down for any reason.
(Keystone in general has a problem having too few lifts, at least when you compare it to adjacent resorts like Breck and Copper. This results in the mountain having lots of funnel points. Hopefully this’ll be mitigated if they go through with the proposal to build a high speed quad in Bergman Bowl)
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I really do love the Argentine Lift and it’s sad to see it go. This year, I’ve skied Keystone 8 times (mostly on weekends) and I have not once seen Argentine run. I was talking to a patroller, and they said Argentine is only used in the mornings to get mountain ops up. I do hope I can snag a chair and if not, maybe some other stuff.
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I know Keystone’s master plan from a decade ago had called for Argentine to be replaced with a high speed quad that had a midstation around where Saint’s John started and then terminated at the top of Paymaster, with a connector trail from there over to Diamondback to allow advanced Mountain House traffic a direct route to North Peak bypassing the Summit House and Mozart, but those have clearly been scrapped with the upgrading of the Peru Express lift.
Realistically, between the old Peru Express and Argentine, I can only speculate that the chairs and towers from the Peru Express quad might be reused for the Bergman Express lift, as Vail’s rumblings have given the impression that they have plans to bring lift service to Bergman Bowl within the next year or so. The Red Buffalo Express (which reused parts from the Montezuma Express lift) shows that this would be plausible, not to mention I feel Keystone might want to have it where all their quads are Doppelmayrs while their six packs are Leitner-Pomas (depending on whether they stay with Leitner-Poma for the Peru Express lift or not).
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Alta and Snowbird were closed and people are trapped for more than 2 days i guess 5 avalanches 3 being large ones went over the road. Little cottonwood canyon is a mess right now.
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Indeed.
https://www.fox13now.com/news/local-news/multiple-avalanches-hit-little-cottonwood-canyon-snowbird-and-alta-closed
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I hope White Pine stays around. We booked the whole place for day of private skiing a few years ago and had a blast!
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Isn’t Agassiz at AZ snow bowl getting replaced with a chondola this summer? Why waste money on a repair for two months? They could just haul skiers up in a cat for that short time period
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Ahhhh because this lift is going to go on living elsewhere on the mountain.
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So Saddleback is planning a high speed quad… Do you think they are going to get it new or used? If used, where from?
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I would think most likely new, but if used maybe the kanc 4 from loon. That is being removed but may just replace another lift on the mountain.
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The Kanc is just a little too short, and it’s probably going to Seven Brothers… They could bring Barker from Sunday River, though it will need to be refurbished to be reliable. And it might end up being more expensive than a new one. Does anyone know if it is possible to order just the terminals from manufacturers?
So a new lift makes more sense.
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I don’t know about detachables but Sugarloaf ordered just a drive terminal from Doppelmayr for King Pine after the rollback incident.
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Peter may have some inside knowledge, but the Press Herald article he links to, doesn’t say it will be a HSQ. They couldn’t reach GM Shephard before the 1/31 printing, so they say, “Shepard has previously said that upgrades will include the replacement of an old chairlift with a high-speed quad chair that will reduce waiting lines;”
Below is the beginning and end of my Snowjournal post:
Here’s the Bangor Daily News article. I didn’t know, condo owners had been asked to make donations. Though not noted as a change, reference to a FGQ rather than a HSQ is at the end.
Prospective buyers are asking Saddleback condo owners to pitch in on resort’s revitalization
By Lori Valigra, BDN Staff • December 11, 2019 1:00 am
In his letter to the Friends of Saddleback, Tower said priority investments will be updating and replacing five outdated ski lifts.
Plans call for spending $3.4 million for a new fixed-grip quad lift with a capacity of 2,000 skiers per hour compared to 750 per hour for the previous double chair lift.
Another $810,000 will go toward a new alpine-style T-bar and $1.2 million to replace the double chair lift.
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Not sure I understand the reference to “updating and replacing five outdated ski lifts”. Might just be a typical journalist mistake, but unless they are planning to replace the nearly-new South Branch and Kennebego quads, I think this should refer only to three lifts.
I’m also confused as to why they’d spend $1.2M to replace a T-Bar with a new T-Bar given that wind isn’t an issue. Will this be to service the racing program? Otherwise it seems kind of silly to drop that coin in a world where over 1/3 of your visits are from snowboarders who notoriously have trouble with surface lifts.
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At today’s BBQ at Saddleback, the new owners announced a brand new detach quad was ordered on Friday (2.14.20), from Doppelmayr. The rep from Doppelmayr was at the event, too! Only 4.5 minute trip from the base to the top of Royal Coachman!
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I forgot to add, 2400 skiers per hour!
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Sad day…Dave McCoy, founder of Mammoth Mountain, passed away today at the age of 105.
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Correction: He was 104.
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New England Ski History considers it to be a fixed grip, citing the same Portland Press Herald article. We’ll have to wait and see, I guess
https://www.newenglandskiindustry.com/viewstory.php?storyid=816
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A statement from GM Andy Shepard dated Feb 2nd included the following: “Our focus will now shift to launching the redevelopment effort, completing our philanthropic campaign to fund the mountain improvements, placing the order for a detachable-grip quad chairlift, building a more powerful and efficient snowmaking system, and renovating the lodge.”
My biggest remaining question is what happens with Cupsuptic and/or Sandy.
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they go on to live for another 20 years!
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My prediction is that Sandy will be replaced but Cupsuptic will remain as is as backup. Saddleback doesn’t want to emulate Sugarloaf’s Spillway chair which is why Sandy will go, but there’s much a lot less that can go wrong with a t-bar.
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