- Washington’s Mission Ridge buys Blacktail Mountain, Montana.
- Bousquet intends to replace the Blue chair with a quad in the next two to three years.
- A gondola is proposed to cross between Kansas and Missouri.
- Bromont adds loading conveyors to two fixed quads; Sun Peaks upgrades Crystal with one too.
- Rusty Gregory says Ikon Pass sales are growing at a faster rate than any previous selling season.
- Vail Resorts will limit ticket sales during holidays, introduce lift line wait time forecasts and devote extra staff to managing lift mazes.
- Catamount touts more than $15 million offseason upgrades including two new chairlifts.
- Whitefish Mountain Resort posts updated trail maps showing Chair 8’s new alignment.
- Next year’s new lift at Whitefish will be called the Snow Ghost Express.
- Justin Sibley becomes CEO of Powdr.
- Jackson Hole’s five year roadmap includes detachable replacements for Thunder and Sublette plus a potential a Lower Faces lift.
- Gallix, the Quebec ski area where lift was damaged by flooding, says repairs will cost over CA$2 million. The bottom station of the chairlift has been disassembled and a new rope ordered.
- Poma and the Government of Brazil reach an agreement to reactivate Rio’s longest urban gondola after 5 years.
- The Telluride Daily Planet explains the gondola evacuation process for one of the more complex systems in the country.
- Manning Park says the atmospheric river which caused flooding across southern British Columbia damaged its alpine ski area.
- Big Sky’s Swift Current will open Thursday with Swifty 6 packs of local beer to celebrate.
- Aspen Mountain is finally approved to add a lift in Pandora’s.
- Connecticut’s Woodbury Ski Area is sold with the new owner intending to reopen it.
Lift Blog 
I really like Jackson Hole’s plan. Keeping the Hobacks relatively isolated while installing a Lower Face lift is definitely a good compromise for the anti-expansion crowd while still better spreading skiers out. The Thunder upgrade also makes sense, as I think most people have assumed that is the next logical upgrade at the mountain. It is also nice to see them upgrading Sublette, and lowering the top terminal a little to get it out of the wind will definitely help. In addition to still being able to access Tensleep, I would just want it to also maintain Cheyenne Bowl/Hoback access.
If this is all in their 5-year plan, that would assume a new lift every other year on average for the next five years, which is pretty impressive.
LikeLike
I could see a low capacity high speed quad in the lower faces
LikeLike
Can someone help me out with where the lower faces at Jackson Hole would be located?
LikeLike
The Lower Faces are the terrain below Rendezvous Trail and South Pass Traverse. Going from south to north (which is how they appear on the skiers right going down Rendezvous and South Pass), the areas are the Hobacks, Sublette Ridge, and Colter Ridge, with a number of more specific trails and bowls within and between the regions. The proposed lift would go from somewhere around the bottom of the Union Pass lift or near the intersection of Way Home and Union Pass Traverse and go to the top Lower Sublette Ridge a bit above the bottom of the Sublette lift. This would make the Sublette Ridge and Colter Ridge terrain lap-able but not the Hobacks.
LikeLike
LikeLike
Based on Mary Kate’s comments, my guess is that the future Sublette 6 will run closer to Laramie Bowl and end further down towards Tensleep.
Regardless, the prospect of two high speeds enabling quick laps on 3500’ of badass terrain is pretty enticing.
LikeLike
Whitefish’s six-pack being called Snow Ghost means there will be two Leitner-Poma six-packs in North America with the name ‘Snow Ghost Express’, the other being Big White’s.
LikeLiked by 1 person
I think unique and cool names like Snow Ghost should remain with the ski hill that originally named it and not be shared around, ya know? :(
LikeLike
Snow Ghosts are a weather phenomenon in the PNW and other places that get wetter snow. Certainly a very cool name, but not unique. Schweitzer formerly had a Snow Ghost lift as well.
LikeLiked by 1 person
Also in Sun Peaks’ Newspost, seems like West Bowl is done after all. I suppose it was probably more than just staffing. They aren’t being very direct about the wording though…
“WEST BOWL T-BAR RETIRES
After a hiatus last winter season, the West Bowl T-bar remains closed for winter 2021-22. This lift has provided us with decades of memories and lift rides, but has now reached the end of its useful life and will transition into a well-deserved retirement.”
The terrain is still open and will even be groomed as a hike to area from burfield and crystal.
LikeLike
Also, that means Sun Peaks is a pretty sizeable 100% Doppelmayr mountain.
LikeLike
I’ve said this in the past, but I think the thing that’d get me by far the most excited about JH would be an expansion over in the vicinity of Green River and/or Four Pines. Jackson Hole has been basically the same size since 1965 but skier visits have been increasing rapidly. With that combination, either lines will get longer or slopes will get more crowded. Adding a ~6000 foot, ~2500 vertical HSQ beyond the current boundray would forever change the resort for the better.
These upgrades aren’t bad by any means though. Sublette as a HSQ will be wild.
LikeLike
Breck’s started load testing on the Freedom SuperChair.
It’s got 20 towers, and what looks to be somewhere around 107 or so chairs.
LikeLike
I remember them saying in this video the exact amount of towers, chairs, and capacity
https://mobile.twitter.com/breckenridgemtn/status/1461476815554310145
LikeLiked by 1 person
In other words, same number of chairs as the Independence SuperChair, but they’ll be much more closely spaced since the lift is about 2,000 feet shorter than Independence.
LikeLike