- Sundance plans to build a detachable from the base of Wildwood to the summit of Red’s in 2026.
- Snowmass proposes replacing both Alpine Springs and Elk Camp.
- Park City breaks ground on the Sunrise Gondola.
- The appeal of Deer Valley’s Lift 7 approval is dropped.
- Angel Fire faces an extended closure of the Chile Express due to gearbox failure.
- A former Eaglecrest manager questions the installation of a used pulse gondola.
- Eaglecrest may not complete the gondola until 2026 or 2027, five years after it arrived in Alaska.
- Vermont reports 4.1 million skier visits, down less than half a percent from last year.
- A team from the University of Utah works to develop a better adaptive bike carrier.
Lift Blog 
Good news about Lift 7 being able to move forward now for Deer Valley.
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Interesting news and criticism around Eaglecrest. The former operations manager highlighted failed past projects as an omen that a new pulse gondola will suffer the same fate.
However, I think it is a very different situation.
1. The city owns the land and already has a delivered lift. It’s almost the same as a private operation, but it does mean they can fast track their own approval and remain more flexible than if they were dealing with USFS. Any hurdles can pretty much be cleared internally.
2. A good chunk of the finances were only made available beccause of the promise of summer operations, both from the city and from Goldbelt. Eaglecrest currently misses out on the throngs of summer cruise tourists, while the summer-only tram in downtown Juneau is slammed. This would both relieve the current demand in the Juneau area, and create a lot of other summer opportunities. This was probably the only way to secure funding, even a Skytrac triple to replace ptarmigan would ONLY be funded by the ski area, not city money budgeted for summer tourists or Goldbelt.
3. Tied to summer crowds, the idea that this is a lift for “30,000 local residents” is flawed. That small a population base wouldn’t provide a large enough ski market to support such an expensive project. 1.4 million people cruise to Juneau every year. 200,000 people ride the tram every summer. Imo, combined with winter use, the numbers are absolutely there to justify its construction.
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The problem isn’t the idea of a pulse gondola. The problem is the age of the used lift they purchased and the necessary re-engineering, which will end up resulting in it costing not much less than a brand-new pulse gondola.
$10M from Goldbelt probably could have bought a brand-new Doppelmayr or LPOA pulse.
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I agree. But that isn’t the criticism they’re getting from the former manager or publicly from the board/city. Albeit, it’s their own project so the criticism could be completely internal.
But the age of the lift or the choice to go used isn’t being brought up by anyone involved. Eaglecrest has also installed 2 VERY used lifts in the last decade, probably leading to the conclusion they can handle installation and maintenance. I’m with you that a pulse gondi is a different beast and simply going with a LPA/Doppelmayr would have been so similar in final cost, so new would have made a ton of sense.
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Yeah but those are all old fixed grip lifts. Not a detachable.
I think they shot themselves in the foot with this one, but time will tell.
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Ryan- the gondola is a fixed grip pulse, not a detachable. 😉
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I stand corrected!
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Definitely high speed six pack replacements for both Alpine Springs and Elk Camp. Both of them should be full 3,000 pph capacity lifts, given the amount of traffic in both pods.
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Per the latest master plan, both will be HSS. Elk Camp 2800 pph, Alpine Springs 3000 pph. Those are proposed numbers. Who knows what the final design parameters will be. For sure they will both be six packs though.
An interesting conundrum that is being worked through is how to phase the Elk Camp replacement. EC is one of our summer lifts, serving the upper half of the bike park and the primary scenic overlook.
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Definitely makes sense why Alpine Springs would need 3,000 pph capacity. It sees use as a lapping lift, but you also have to use it to transit from the west side of the mountain (Sheer Bliss, Big Burn, Sam’s Knob) over to the east side (Two Creeks and Elk Camp) and vice-versa.
Elk Camp is a lapping lift only, and 2,800 pph (and chair spacing akin to DeMoisy’s) is doable (though I imagine that lift being designed so more chairs can be added at a future date).
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Alpine Springs would be well suited to upgrade to a gondola or tele mix (gondola/HSE), it seems like a ride up that lift is always necessary when working ones way across the mountain in either direction, I remember almost always long lines at that lift also.
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Alpine Springs is not in an alignment that’s suited to a gondola or a chondola. I doubt people lapping the pod would want to take their gear off after each run, nor do I imagine the same being true of those transiting through.
Come to think of it, the Coney Glade replacement this year will move some traffic off of Alpine Springs and Sheer Bliss. The bottom terminal on the new lift will be where Adams Avenue empties out, right around where Burlingame originally started. So a transiting skier traveling from Elk Camp/Two Creeks over to Sam’s Knob no longer has to ride Alpine Springs or the Village Express. They can now just ski down Adams Avenue, ride up the new Coney Glade, and then transit over on Lunchline to Sam’s Knob (Alpine Springs is still the more direct route from the east side over to Big Burn, by riding the lift, then skiing down Green Cabin to Sheer Bliss).
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For the most part I agree with this take, except that if one’s intention is to get to Sam’s Knob efficiently from points east or downhill of Sheer Bliss, VX is the way to go
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I wish they would place the new Alpine Springs lift in the old Naked Lady liftline, as that has better access from Funnel and to Turkey Trot. But it seems like they are going to replace it in place.
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