Two of Bald Mountain’s most popular lifts – Christmas and Seattle Ridge – will be upgraded from quads to larger lifts under a plan up for Forest Service approval. The project follows hot on the heels of two similar upgrade projects taking place this summer at Sun Valley. Construction crews with Doppelmayr are working to replace Greyhawk and Challenger with new four and six seat chairlifts on the Warm Springs side of the mountain. When both projects are complete, Sun Valley Resort will have replaced four of its seven Yan detachable quads built in the late 1980s and early 1990s. The last three up for replacement will be Frenchman’s, Lookout Express and River Run Express in future seasons.
The new Christmas lift will feature both six passenger chairs and enclosed gondola cabins. This will create a base-to-summit gondola route in conjunction with the existing Roundhouse Gondola, which runs from River Run Day Lodge to the mid mountain Roundhouse. Christmas Chondola will load at the Roundhouse and increase capacity from 2,400 guests per hour to 3,000 per hour. The top terminal location will move slightly to provide better connectivity with the Lookout Day Lodge for foot passengers riding the new chondola.
On Seattle Ridge, another new six pack will similarly increase capacity from 2,400 to 3,000 skiers per hour. This new lift will also travel in a slightly modified alignment to accommodate a new ski patrol facility. “Both of the existing lifts are over 35 years old and are nearing the end of their operational lifespans,” the Forest Service wrote in its scoping letter. “Replacement of the lifts would ensure a safe and reliable user experience, and increased lift capacity would help address the long lift lines experienced at both lifts in their existing condition.”
A public meeting about Sun Valley’s latest projects is scheduled for Thursday, August 31st from 4:30 to 6:00 pm at the Ketchum Library. Public comments can also be submitted online to comments-intermtn-sawtooth-ketchum@usda.gov.
Lift Blog 
I’m guessing that both will likely be D-line
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Man, they’ve really de-prioritized upgrading Mayday to a detachable, but I guess it makes sense to phase out the Yappelmayrs. I wonder which resorts are going to try to hold out the longest on their Yan conversions.
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Chances are good that the last of the FrankenYans will be the two Poma conversions at Pico and the Summit Chair / Yankee Clipper at Mt. Snow.
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June mtn would like a word.
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Oooo I forgot about those! Yup add it to the list
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I could see Great Escape being one of the holdouts that lasts longer than others, but on the other hand, Schweitzer’s various other improvements make me think an LPA six pack will be what replaces it in years to come.
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I get that they want a gondola ride all the way from River Run to Lookout, but that should then be an extension of Roundhouse via a second stage. Except for the top half of Christmas Bowl, all of the bowl skiing off of Lookout and Bald Mountain is on the slow 45-year-old Mayday. Christmas Bowl is intermediate all the way down, and the Christmas Lift should end somewhere on Lower Broadway. It would also make it easier for beginners to get back to Warm Springs from Seattle Ridge.
I am guessing Sun Valley will have all of their Doppelmayr-Yan lifts replaced within the next 5 years based on their relative similar age and aggressive schedule. The Holding Family has the money to make it happen!
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I can see them pausing replacements after this for a few years to work on other projects, like a new Lookout Lodge or finally replacing Mayday. Christmas is the oldest Yoppelmayr remaining, so it is time for an upgrade. Seattle Ridge is the only lift I’ve seen at Sun Valley with consistent long lift lines, so I think demand is why it is being replaced now. River Run and Lookout Express would probably be fine for another 5 years and I think Frenchman’s can soldier on longer than that, since it is used the least.
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I absolutely love lookout lodge and hope they don’t replace it. The vibe is rad and I love the food they serve. Taco salad for days!
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The vibe is the raddest! But sadly it feels like a foregone conclusion. They’ll have new lifts dropping people at Lookout from both sides of the mountain with expanded capacity. They’ll upgrade Lookout Lodge next :(
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I agree with you both. The bunker is awesome, but totally not on-brand and not roomy enough for the possible influx of the fur-lined-hood and illogical-boot set. It’s the only modest lodge at either of the Holdings’ holdings. (If you are of a certain age, you might know from where I stole that line.) I vote keep it, and tell the hosers to take off, but I am decidedly the opposite of Grand America/Sinclair/Carol’s target market.
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The real question is why Sun Valley hasn’t sold any of those gorgeous teardrop YAN chairs. I want one SOOO bad. Just saw on their instagram that Frenchman’s has the old Challenger chairs. So adding more teardrops to the boneyard.
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I’m kind of surprised they didn’t do the extension of the Roundhouse Gondola that had been talked about in the past, but I’m guessing they decided people would have to wait too long mid-mountain.
So as a person who’s never seen one, how does a Chondola work exactly? Do they generally alternate between chairs and gondolas at the same time? Seems like it would be a headache to board that way. Or would they say park all of the gondolas during the ski day and just use chairlifts before switching to all gondolas for evening/dinner?
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Chairs and cabins have their own separate loading areas.
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Thank you for this. Makes more sense.
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Our Eagle telemix loads gondola cabins on the arrival side, and chairs on the departure as most detaches do. The tire speed is much slower on the arrival side to allow for loading; the chairs and cabins actially speed up a bit before the contour. It does make for a shorter gondola loading interval that way. We have 8-person cabins but only load 6 because we just don’t have enough time before the doors close.
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That’s the usual setup for lower capacity chondolas. High capacity ones use turnouts so that gondolas and chairs take completely different turnarounds and have long loading areas. That is of course rather expensive and also increases the number of failure points.
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Do like the Mammoth gondola. Stay on gondola #1 at the mid station and they can connect you on gondola #2 for a ride to the top
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I think this makes a lot of sense. I really like the Chondola plan, and Seattle Ridge was the only place I saw a line when I skied Sun Valley. Mayday isn’t very long, and most of the Sun Valley crowd don’t want to ski that type of terrain.
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Upgrades that makes sense. Increasing uphill capacity out of Warm Springs means a need to move more bodies around mid-mountain and Seattle Ridge.
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Love the improvements, but how are they going to walk the foot passengers down to the Christmas Lift from Round House Gondy in the winter? The maps from SE Group show the bottom terminal in the same spot. Everyone is skiing between those lifts from Broadway, Roundhouse Lane, and heading to Gun Tower Lane. It would be entertaining to people watch. It’s Sun Valley, so anything could be on the board. A snow cross walk? A foot passenger tunnel? It’s pretty steep from the gondola platform to the Christmas maze… so maybe a foot passenger bridge? Plus in the summer, I assume they would take the chairs off to put the bike carriers on? Those gondy bike carriers are cool. So many operational questions.
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Hadn’t thought about non-skiing operations. For skiers and boarders, does it not make sense to realign the Christmas lift to actually serve as a lapping lift for Christmas Bowl? That runout down to the new Broadway lift looks long on the map.
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Fun seeing the comments and excitement on here about SV.
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When? Timing seems unclear.
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Seattle Ridge 6 is now official.
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I thought it was gonna be a D-Line according to the 2024 lifts
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