Lake Tahoe’s Homewood Mountain Resort has abandoned plans for a private club in favor of remaining open to the public alongside selling club memberships. Homewood hopes this hybrid model will pave the way for installation of a new gondola, which was postponed this summer due to public outcry over privatization. The new gondola is the second recent lift project for JMA Ventures, which just yesterday celebrated the completion of the new Stache Express at its resort in Red Lodge, Montana.
Under a new draft agreement sent to the Tahoe Regional Planning Authority (TRPA), Homewood will remain open to the public in both winter and summer via season passes and daily lift tickets. This should allow the TRPA to approve gondola construction under an existing 2011 master plan. In a statement, TRPA said it is “reviewing the information and is in consultation with Homewood Mountain Resort to understand how the earlier proposal to change the character of the resort’s operation is being revised. This information will help the agency determine if the resort will be required to amend the larger resort master plan. A determination on that will be made before action is taken on the gondola project or any other project application at the resort.”
The gondola, which was already ordered and partially delivered to Homewood, will be built by Doppelmayr and run from the North Lodge to mid-mountain, replacing the Madden triple. The gondola will feature eight place Omega V cabins and become the third D-Line lift in California. The gondola will rise approximately 1,000 vertical feet, making Homewood’s entire 1,840 foot vertical drop accessible via detachable lifts for the first time. Homewood plans to build a new mid-mountain facility at the top of the gondola, which will be open to the public alongside club members. Pending approval, the new lift could open as soon as the 2024-25 ski season.
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This gondola should really terminate at the top of Homewood vs mid mountain, while having a midstation at the top of the current Madden triple. JMA’s ski resort operation really baffles me.
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Agreed, It should run all the way to the top of Ellis Peak, with a mid station near the top of Old Homewood & Ellis Chairs.
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While we’re at it, we could debate whether it should be a gondola or a chondola, or even if a simple HSQ would suffice.
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Yeah… If you’re gonna run a gondola to the proposed top terminal, what’s the point of gong d-line? If the reason to not go to the current summit is $… Then why not really save and just build a non d-line hsq or 6?
The current setup would make sense if their were future plans to add on to the first terminal with a longer stage to the top (when they can afford it) ala Wild Blue, or as part of a much larger expansion plan that would significantly increase capacity needs.
Homewood is dropping a lot of cash for a midway lift that will often not even be serving more than 1 open trail.
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Could it be they’re thinking about potential downloads in low snow years? Gondolas definitely a lot easier than a chair for that.
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A chondola makes the most sense. JMA wants to build a massive mid-mountain lodge that overlooks the lake with spectacular views and a gondola is the best avenue for this type of venture. I’m guessing this gondola would operate until 11pm at night based on how close it is to Tahoe City and Olympic Village.
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I agree with the other people commenting that this really makes no sense. A very expensive short lift rising only 1,000 feet. Doppelmayr must have been scratching their heads when the order came in.
I can only guess that they were stuck in the contract they had already put money into when they were trying to make it some sort of exclusive club. After alienating the local Tahoe skiers and pissing off the TRPA they walked that back and now here we are. Seems like throwing good money after bad to me, but I hope it works out for them.
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JMA is not a ski resort operator in my opinion. They own and operate high end luxury properties and just so happen to own two ski areas in its portfolio with the grand vision of making them into high end properties. However, when Vail acquired Northstar, that’s exactly what it did by building a massive village and bringing in The Ritz-Carlton to make it the gem of Tahoe and Homewood was left is the dust. For those who don’t know, when JMA acquired Homewood, it quickly acquired Alpine Meadows from Powdr Corp (2007) to link the two resorts together with a massive gondola. However, when the financial recession hit in 2009, it then sold Alpine Meadows to KSL (2011). Looking at how JMA has not replaced the lodge that burnt down at Tahoe Ski Bowl or can’t replace broken glass for its lift operator shacks, going D-LINE makes no sense other than putting makeup on a pig to make it look pretty. MCP should step in and acquire both of JMA’s ski areas. My two cents! https://www.sierrasun.com/news/sold-jma-ventures-finalizes-purchase-of-alpine-meadows/
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For those who don’t know, Ellis Peak is in Homewood’s permit boundary and is only accessibly by snowcat. Therefore, extending the gondola to the peak makes sense.
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I would think summer operation would have to be a big part of this Gondola??
Each cabin, hanger and grip have to be in the 50K range??
Other wise it would be a 4 month operation most years.
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I think that’s the main purpose and have a giant restaurant overlooking the lake while offering a variety of summer activities. The only issue is that several of the other ski areas have conquered summer operations, but maybe Homewood can find that niche with fine dining. In addition, Homewood suffers from a lack of parking and when it snows, its parking lots suffer the consequences because it has no where to put it other than to eliminate spots to accommodate it until it melts.
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It would be unique to see the Madden triple shortened to it current mid station and the have the gondola run to the top. But hey its just a spitball thought.
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JMA needs to have a clear, consistent vision. The resort has struggled to be profitable because it is more difficult to reach than peers with comparable (or better) snow and terrain, so it was proposed to become private to be profitable through prestige. However, that has now fallen out of favor, and it is unclear where the resort goes from here. The gondola was ordered under a prior vision, but it is already partially delivered so it may as well be installed at this point. This is not Vail Resorts where another mountain can come in and use a spare lift.
There are legitimate problems with Homewood that need to be addressed. It is too big to be a low-cost operation, its terrain that best holds snow is only accessible by snowcat, and it needs a much larger bed base to improve accessibility. Fixing this will take a lot of capital and commitment.
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It ‘currently’ offers lack luster terrain, short runs and NO VIBE! I’ve almost killed myself while skiing there. Homewood runs a questionable operation in my opinion where it ‘appeared’ they would groom a run a Thursday, have it closed on Friday and open it on a Saturday causing for chaos. I loved the old school ski area vibe while there, but due to its lower elevation and being one of the longest resorts to get to, Homewood does have some serious challenges. It almost needs to be one of those ski/stay type of resorts but why. It needs a serious rebranding if you ask me and its current ambition is too late.
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To expand on my last post. The old school vibe was awesome prior to the Tahoe Ski Bowl lodging burning down and it letting go of the terrain park team. Those guys would do hot lapse with people just to keep busy.
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Yeah the whole project is about as crazy as it gets!
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I really appreciate everyone’s dialog here along with the initial write up, Peter! All great information and insight. I think Homewood is still a really great local mountain, it still has some of that small-town vibe they could capitalize on. This doesn’t really exist anymore in the western US.
I’m growing irritated seeing Homewood/JMA management continue to flaunt the statistic there has been a “10-year 40% decline in skier visits and a 64% decline in season passholders” noted in articles elsewhere. Do you know what Homewood was doing in 2011? They had a partnership with Alpine where you could ride both resorts under the same pass per agreements between JMA and KSL. If I recall, the year prior this also included Squaw pending their sale. They never mention that. It was awesome, gave you local choices, and appeared to relieve much of the southern pressure from Highway 89. This is also the same year the previous Homewood master plan was approved. They were on the up-and-up. I’m not saying the Ikon/Epic passes haven’t contributed to the other resorts being hugged-to-death and stealing share from Homewood, they certainly have, those lines are absolutely miserable. But a quick google search will lead you to articles where they note Homewood ridership in 2011 was up 500% and local skiers were getting irritated because it was too busy! So they are reporting a decline from a 10-year statistic with their highest year of engagement? You know what Homewood has done since 2011 to increase ridership? You noted it; Effectively nothing, if not reduced key amenities. Grooming has gotten worse or non-existent, if not dangerous in spots. On site amenities have gotten worse including the very suspect burning of the South Lodge (what was ~half of the onsite amenities). Staffing has been a consistent issue (while they try and turn the local island community into a billionaires club while also citing access issues). Weathering and inoperable lift equipment year-over-year (The 1960’s era Ellis chair consistently breaking down, accessing over 30% of the terrain, while they just recently replaced the towers only)?! The removal of terrain park and staff even though their 23/24 maps still say they have over four of them (Kolby’s used to be an awesome progression park). They haven’t had a real park in years! And then you have Art Chapman (JMA) telling TRPA they’ve really tried and ‘invested’ $10 million since their acquisition of Homewood in 2006 “including the install of the HSDQ Homewood Express”. Of that $10 million how much was that HS quad? How much does that leave for year-over-year improvements if they were really ‘investing’?
They are gaslighting the public making it seem like its an issue with them and the increased desire to ride Ikon/Epic resorts, when they’ve literally pushed us off the lift and out the non-existent gondola door to the next best local option (which is causing much of the issues they’re citing). And instead of taking care of the bare necessities with their capital improvements, they install new towers on an aging lift and procure a 1000’ vert 8-pack gondola? They either know something us ‘poors’ don’t know, or they’re completely inept at ski operations.
To Ron’s point; I would have loved to see the faces of the Doppelmyer sales, engineering, and management teams when the order came through.
As much of a rant as this is, I’m still a pass-holder and riding up to a line-less quad for hot-lap after lap on a Saturday afternoon is something I’ll never take for granted.
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