- Sun Peaks’ seventh quad chair is complete.
- Lake Louise previews Canada’s only expansion for 2020.
- Camelback announces the new Sunbowl Quad will extend higher than the lifts it replaces.
- Mission Ridge forges its own path erecting a used high speed quad in house with local contractors.
- Alterra’s Rusty Gregory talks about winter demand.
- Cannon Mountain’s tramway will likely start the season on indefinite hold due to public health concerns.
- Australian regulators conclude hand carrying bikes on chairlifts is not safe.
- After six months closed, the Palm Springs Tramway reopens at less than 25 percent capacity.
- Soldier Mountain reveals comm lines, chairs and haul ropes were all damaged in this summer’s fire.
- Another new resort will join the Indy Pass, to be announced Monday.
News
As Pandemic Persists, Doppelmayr Lays Off 190 Workers
Facing a significant drop in orders, the Doppelmayr Garaventa Group has made the difficult decision to cut about six percent of its global workforce. Out of the nearly 200 positions eliminated, 95 are at the firm’s Austrian headquarters. Prior to the layoffs, Doppelmayr employed approximately 3,400 people at sites circling the globe, including at North American bases in Salt Lake City, Utah and Saint-Jérôme, Quebec.
Globally, around 50 percent of Doppelmayr’s business happens at ski resorts. When other leisure and tourism segments are included, that number grows to 80 percent. In the last complete year before Covid shutdowns, North American lift installations included places hit hard in the pandemic economy: theme parks, cruise ports and sports stadiums. Even urban gondolas, which offer the promise of socially-distanced transportation, depend on municipal and regional tax revenues to be built.
“Despite a few attractive individual projects, the order situation has decreased significantly in recent months, and an uncertain winter with few or postponed investments in cable cars is approaching us,” said Thomas Pichler, Managing Director of Doppelmayr Holding SE. “We now have to adapt our workforce to the changed order situation.”
In North America, the company saw all its orders from Alterra Mountain Company, Boyne Resorts and Vail Resorts postponed earlier this year. While the upcoming 2020-21 winter will hopefully be successful for many ski areas, Doppelmayr’s customers again face immense uncertainty at a time when 2021 capital projects need to be planned and financed. Doppelmayr is optimistic that a headcount reduction now will enable it to survive and thrive as travel recovers. “We assume that with this new workforce we will have a stable number of employees for the next few years,” noted Pichler.
News Roundup: Good Things
- A developer looks to build a new sightseeing/biking/hiking chairlift near Park City.
- Soldier Mountain, rebuilding from a summer wildfire, vows to open on time in December.
- The Sea to Sky Gondola turns its (re)construction fence into a fundraiser for local charities.
- More than 10,000 people weighed in on Burnaby Mountain Gondola routes.
- Here’s the latest on Aspen’s new Lift One in video form.
- Mad River Glen gets a James Niehues trail map. For a limited time a portion of all purchases on James’ website via this link will benefit Lift Blog.
- A landslide makes a mess of a chairlift in Italy.
- Check out progress on the Doppelmayr and Leitner sections of North America’s largest lift construction project.
- Bear’s Den Mountain, now Thrill Hills, hopes to reopen this winter after five years shuttered.
- Nordic Valley is a busy place with six pack construction underway.
- Home to Alaska’s first two gondolas, Icy Strait Point is Seatrade’s Global Cruise Port of the Year for 2020.
- Sky Tavern will replace its platter lifts with carpets.
- Arizona Snowbowl’s huge new Telemix will be called the Arizona Gondola.
- Alterra reorganizes with three divisions: Mountain, Hospitality and Real Estate.
- Big Sky aims to launch Swift Current 6 by Thanksgiving 2021 and now envisions three gondola sections rising from Mountain Village to the Tram.
- Fire crews work to contain a small blaze at Purgatory Resort.
- The Forest Service approves construction of a gondola and backside expansion at Snow King Mountain, subject to a customary objection period.
News Roundup: Going Virtual
- Beaver Creek’s website is updated to show the McCoy Park expansion coming for the 2021-22 ski season.
- Doppelmayr will build a $9.3 million temporary gondola for a horticulture show in Germany.
- A developer in St. George, Utah looks to build a lift-served bike park.
- An unnamed ski area in New York hits the market with an asking price of $1.6 million.
- The pandemic may have actually helped Timberline Mountain rebuild faster this summer.
- Searchmont, located near the Ontario-Michigan border with two new lifts under construction, remains uncertain what this winter will look like.
- Jamie Storrs, Senior Manager of Communications for Vail Resorts in the east, answers questions about reservations and more on the Out of Bounds Podcast.
- Spirit Mountain receives a $300,000 cash infusion allowing it to open this winter.
- Solitude profiles a major maintenance project on the Eagle Express.
- The Park Record checks in on Mayflower Mountain Resort construction and The Wall Street Journal reports Extell would like to partner with an established ski operator like Vail or Alterra.
- Indy Pass sales are pacing six times higher than last year!
- New Alaska ski area Skeetawk plans a December 5th grand opening.
- Poma launches a fresh new website.
- Mt. Baldy, Ontario, which initially held off on construction of a new chairlift this summer, decides to proceed with a fall installation.
- A virtual open house is now open for Los Angeles Aerial Rapid Transit project scoping.
Sea to Sky Gondola Offers $250,000 Reward for Info on Crimes
Reeling from its haul rope being cut twice in 13 months, the Sea to Sky Gondola Limited Partnership today announced a CA$250,000 bounty for information leading to the arrest and conviction of individual(s) responsible. The gondola cable was first cut on August 10th, 2019 and again on September 14th, 2020. The reward will be funded entirely by the gondola’s owners and not by taxpayers.
“This individual on both occasions came very close to hurting people,” remarked General Manager Kirby Brown in an afternoon press conference at the gondola base. “This individual hurt our community and certainly hurt our business. As we begin the incredibly dangerous and delicate extraction process yet again, this individual has put my team directly in harm’s way. This individual is a criminal who needs to be caught and brought to justice.” Kirby estimated 25 to 30 of the 39 cabins that were on the system this time will be written off and damage will again total in the millions.
Surveillance footage of the incident and a description of suspect(s) may be released at a later date. Police are urging anyone with video of the Sea to Sky Highway north and south of the gondola location from September 13th at 8:00 pm to September 14th at 2:00 pm to please contact them. Video could be in the form of dash cam from a vehicle, house surveillance, or business footage. To qualify for the reward, information must be provided directly to a police officer, to the Police Gondola Information Line at 604-892-6122, or by email at gondola.info@rcmp-grc.gc.ca.
News Roundup: Vail Numbers
- Vail Resorts has sold 850,000 season passes as of September 18th, an 18 percent increase compared to last year at this time.
- CEO Rob Katz assures skiers reservations should be widely available for most resorts on most days.
- Vail lost $153.6 million in the quarter ended July 31st compared with an $89.5 million loss in the same period last year.
- For the full fiscal year 2020, Vail reported a net income of $98.8 million, a decrease of 67.2 percent.
- The company also recently cut 410 jobs.
- Regarding capital projects and the seven lift projects Vail postponed this year, Katz said on the conference call:
“We are of course going to be monitoring the season closely before we come out with any plan for calendar year 2021. We’ll make sure we’re incorporating what happened this year. We will likely still be in a conservative approach though hopefully not as conservative as last year because the environment around Covid and travel has all improved. We will definitely be prioritizing projects that we think will have a significant impact on the guest experience and certainly some of the projects that we deferred from last year will be top of the list.”
- Government-owned Marble Mountain remains on the hunt for a private operating partner.
- Towers are up for the largest new lift of the year.
- A fire comes uncomfortably close to Mt. Waterman, California.
- More than 6,500 people commented on Little Cottonwood Canyon transportation alternatives including a possible 3S.
- Mont-Sainte-Anne’s gondola remains inoperable following last winter’s mishaps but the ski area expects it to reopen in December.
- Disney won’t open chairlift-accessed Blizzard Beach until at least March of 2021.
- The Sea to Sky Gondola reopens its base facilities.
- Defunct Vermont ski area Snow Valley is for sale.
- The Town of Mountain Village acquires 20 used gondola cabins for social distancing at the base of Telluride.
- The last chance to comment on Burnaby Mountain Gondola routes is Wednesday.
- The Forest Service signs off on two new lifts and removal of three old ones at Waterville Valley.
- Snow King’s gondola is approved by the Town of Jackson.
- Whiteface will auction off retired cabins from the Cloudsplitter Gondola.
- Indy Pass adds Swain Resort in New York.
- The Central Wasatch Commission seeks feedback on potential 3S gondola transportation from Alta to Brighton and/or Brighton to Park City.
- Le Relais eliminates season passes entirely. Guests will buy blocks of skiing until they reach a certain total for the season, then all remaining blocks are free.
- A local investment banker will take over operations of nonprofit Sleeping Giant Ski Area.
- Bogus Basin’s Morning Star Express will miss the final two weekends of the season.
- A lot of Covid operating plans are coming out these days. This one from Mt. Hood Meadows stands out as excellent.
- Sugarloaf GM Karl Strand joins the Storm Skiing Podcast for a discussion on the West Mountain expansion and Sugarloaf 2030 lift plans.
- Former Aspen CMO Christian Knapp launches Lift Ticket, a new series about resorts navigating Covid.
- Doppelmayr unveils a new Wir magazine.
Yosemite’s Badger Pass Will Not Open This Season
The multinational hospitality company which operates Badger Pass in Yosemite National Park has announced the ski area will not operate for winter 2020-21. Badger Pass is one of only three US ski areas located in a National Park and features four fixed grip chairlifts and 90 acres of terrain.
“Due to ongoing concerns related to COVID-19, Badger Pass Ski Area will not open for the 2020-21 season. This includes both Nordic and downhill operations,” read a statement from Aramark Corporation, which operates Badger under a long term agreement with the National Park Service. “We are in the process of contacting season pass holders with the option of a season pass rollover or refund. Thank you for your continued interest in California’s original ski area, and we hope to see you next season,” the statement continued. Publicly-traded Aramark reported a $328 million operating loss in the most recent quarter with revenue down 46 percent due to the pandemic.
News Roundup: California Dreaming
- The Town of Jackson, Wyoming inches closer to approving the Snow King Gondola five years after it was first proposed.
- Aspen Skiing Company eliminates nearly 50 positions citing the “ever shifting Covid landscape.”
- The Miami Dolphins won’t operate their SkyView stadium gondola this NFL season.
- In New Zealand, ski resorts say they are not the mask police.
- Alps resorts prepare to reopen this month.
- The Colorado Passenger Tramway Safety Board grants a variance for a new Telemix on Aspen Mountain.
- Ikon Pass holders will need a reservation to visit certain resorts this season while other mountains will not require reservations and more are still deciding.
- Big Sky’s Lone Peak Tram will be open this winter but guests may be allowed to boot pack to the summit as an alternative.
- A second indoor ski resort for the United States moves ahead near DC.
- Aspen Snowmass and other creditors will appeal a judge’s decision to keep Liftopia out of bankruptcy.
- Some Canadians aren’t happy with Vail’s pandemic-era customer service.
- Magic Mountain, Idaho is threatened by a wildfire.
- A study finds the proposed Oakland Athletics gondola would carry a million riders a year and generate $685 million in economic activity.
- This summer’s construction projects are just the beginning for the new Saddleback Mountain.
- A planned urban gondola in Los Angeles get a fresh name and website as it prepares for environmental review.
- Leitner Ropeways will build New Zealand’s first eight passenger chairlift.
- The Utah Department of Transportation continues to refine alternatives for Little Cottonwood Canyon and will release a report this fall.
- Great Bear solicits bids for a new chairlift.
News Roundup: Name Change
- MND introduces a new brand with four divisions: MND Snow, MND Safety, MND Leisure and MND Ropeways (formerly LST.)
- MND expects a return to profitability next year and projects the global ropeway market will reach $4.3 billion in 2024.
- Construction gets underway on the third MND T-Bar in the United States.
- Wolf Creek leaves Colorado Ski Country USA.
- North America’s longest gondola misses Labor Day weekend due to a mechanical issue.
- Sun Peaks won’t spin the West Bowl T-Bar this winter.
- Jackson Hole will increase lift speeds and allow skiers to bypass the Aerial Tram by hiking to the summit this winter.
- China Peak reports minimal on-mountain damage from the Creek Fire so far.
- Killington will open later than normal with 50 percent lift capacity.
- Here’s the latest Timberline Mountain construction update.
News Roundup: Perfect
- Squaw Valley President and COO Ron Cohen explains why the resort’s name is changing and gives an update on the Squaw-Alpine gondola.
- The other Squaw ski area will not be changing names.
- Whitefish cuts the line for its future Hellroaring lift.
- Icy Strait Point, home to two new Doppelmayr gondolas, is in the running for Global Cruise Port of the Year.
- Nitehawk commences fundraising to replace its destroyed chairlift, though the community ski area may only be able to afford a T-Bar.
- Jay Peak reopens its tram tomorrow with freshly-slipped track ropes.
- The public is asked to weigh in on three Burnaby Mountain Gondola alignments.
- Red Mountain becomes the eighth Ikon Pass destination in Canada.
- Big Snow’s reopening first chair goes up empty in honor of the more than 14,000 New Jerseyans who have died from Covid.
- The first lifts at Mayflower Mountain Resort are now set to open in 2023 instead of 2021. A new project video suggests it will be worth the wait.
- Mad River Glen will get a James Niehues trail map if fundraising efforts succeed.
- Granby Ranch gets a new owner and operator.
- The Perfect family has pumped more than $13 million into Timberline Mountain this offseason, including the two new chairlifts which are 75 percent complete.
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