Timberline Four Seasons Resort, which has struggled with lift breakdowns and otherissues of late, is closed this weekend and could be placed in receivership.
Snow Valley missed all of President’s weekend will remain closed indefinitely due to road damage. Mountain High is kindly honoring their season passes during the shutdown.
In France, a six year old is seriously injured after her head gets stuck between a chair armrest and safety bar.
As a new lawsuit against The Hermitage Club alleges fraud, club founder Jim Barnes tells members a revised reorganization plan is coming soon.
LST Ropeways is still working to repair the company’s first detachable chairlift, which missed its entire first winter, some of last winter and all of this one thus far.
Mexico City announces its first Cablebús line will be the longest urban gondola in the world at nearly 31,000 feet. A full ride would take 46 minutes with 374 ten passenger cabins transporting up to 4,000 passengers per hour each way.
According to the New York State contracting website, the Gore Mountain Sunway, High Peaks, Hudson and Whiteface Bear Den lift replacement projects that went out to bid last fall are all on hold. Two bids were received for the Olympic Jumping Complex gondola in Lake Placid but no builder has been selected as of January 18th.
A chair falls off a 1993 Yan detachable quad in Spain, closing an entire ski resort indefinitely.
Lift service returns to Killington’s South Ridge for the first time in a decade as of yesterday.
Les Otten lobbies for a new bill that would permit public financing for The Balsams redevelopment.
The proposed gondola in Idaho Springs, Colorado would be modeled after the Sea to Sky Gondola, which now carries more than 400,000 riders a year in British Culumbia. The 1.2 mile Colorado version would rise 1,100 feet above Interstate 70.
The largest lost ski resort in Canada, Fortress Mountain, could reopen with a mix of new and refurbished lifts in 2020.
Sun Valley and Snowbasin ditch the Mountain Collective Pass for a partnership with Vail Resorts and the Epic Pass starting next winter.
The Laconia Daily Sun explains how Highland Mountain Bike Park finds success on the grounds of a long lost New Hampshire ski area.
The former longtime operator of Timberline Four Seasons Resort is indicted, accused of illegally prescribing pain drugs. The ski area suffered a major lift accident in 2016 and has operated only sporadically this winter.
A proposed settlement could see the Hermitage Club parent company give control of the Barnstormer chairlift to the investors who bought it.
Pajarito reopens one of two chairlifts which became inoperable over a month ago.
A gondola window falls hundreds of feet and nearly injures a farmer working below in Taiwan.
The one year old T-Bar at Burke Mountain is now the D-Bar, named in honor of longtime supporter Don Graham. Mr. Graham once saved the mountain from closure, covered years of operating losses and personally financed half of the Mid Burke Express.
The first D-Line lift in New Zealand won’t be built this summer after all and The Remarkables will place 60 containers of lift parts into storage until government approval comes through.
A little ski resort in Labrador has as many new lifts as Whistler Blackcomb this winter – three!
A proposed gondola in Oakland would generate hundreds of millions of dollars in economic benefits, says a new study.
Waterville Valley explains why some of its lifts are out of service.
Recently closed Vermont area Plymouth Notch goes up for sale along with its 1964 Mueller double.
The old high speed quad from Horseshoe, Ontario is still available.
Faced with the possibility of losing its operating lease completely, Sunshine Village reluctantly agrees to new guidelines that remove the proposed Goat’s Eye tramway, Bye Bye Bowl expansion and Wildside lift from future consideration. A second lift in the existing gondola corridor, Goat’s Eye II, Lookout, Hayes Hill and Lower Meadow Park expansions are still possible.
Environmental groups and Squaw Alpine are still sparring over the proposed California Express gondola.
Resorts across the Pacific Northwest come to the aid of Hurricane Ridge season pass holders, who lost a month of their season due to the government shutdown.
Rain delays the debut of Spider Mountain, the seventh lift-based destination for Mountain Capital Partners.
As the shutdown drags on, there are at least 13 resorts waiting on federal analysis of new lift projects by my count.
A group of homeowners who invested to build the bubble six pack at the Hermitage Club worry Berkshire Bank could foreclose on the chairlift.
Whistler Blackcomb loses its claim to the world’s longest unsupported lift span but now features the longest continuous gondola system and the highest capacity gondola in North America.
A Maine county joins the state in suing the owner of Big Squaw Mountain for failing to operate the resort, which once was the second largest in Vacationland.
The Lift 1 Corridor Project heads to Aspen voters March 5th.
Santo Domingo, the largest city in the Dominican Republic, solicits bids for its third and fourth urban gondola sections with hourly capacities of 6,000 and 4,500, respectively.
Last month’s lift evacuation at Whitefish got worldwide media attention. The Flathead Beacondigs into why the mountain was so well prepared for the situation.
A large pipe broke on Christmas Eve at Stratton Mountain Resort, sending a gush of water into the path of the mountain’s gondola. Videos circulating on social media show a few cabins bearing the brunt of the geyser and Stratton Mountain Resort released the following statement via yesterday’s snow report:
“At about 3:30 pm Christmas Eve, a break in a snowmaking pipe on Lower Standard sent water at a 45 degree angle toward the gondola. Snowmaking computers showed a drop in pressure and operators immediately began the process of shutting down the system. The operations team simultaneously stopped the lift, restarting it slowly to reposition the cabins. Approximately seven minutes later, the gondola made its way to the summit where guests disembarked. We are pleased to report that no one was injured in what was a scary episode for seven skiers and riders in two gondola cabins. The gondola is running as usual today and snowmaking operations continue using alternate pipes in the network.”
The Poma-built Stratton Mountain Gondola opened in 1988 and received 58 new Sigma Diamond cabins in 2014. Thankfully the water line broke near the gondola and not under an open chairlift. Great job Stratton crews moving cabins out of harm’s way and getting the water stopped so quickly.
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