- A mechanic loses his life while working on a lift at Sunrise Park Resort.
- T-Bar from Le Relais arrives at Ascutney Mountain with installation dependent on fundraising.
- Poma to build Medellín Metrocable’s sixth urban gondola, set to open in 2019.
- Stoneham’s new quad chair will be called L’Éclipse.
- A new 8-passenger Poma gondola nears opening in Zacatecas, Mexico.
- Al Henceroth of A-Basin fame gives not one but two great updates on the upcoming Beavers lift.
- A six-pack called Alpenglow anchors the new Eldora.
- Spruce Peak 2.0 opens Saturday at Sunday River, 17 months after the original Borvig fell over.
- A foot passenger who fell unloading a chairlift in March 2016 sues Silverton Mountain.
- Skytrac does another insightful interview with Kris Blomback, GM at Pats Peak.
News
News Roundup: Express
- Both Doppelmayr and Leitner-Poma show off gondolas at the International Association of Amusement Parks and Attractions expo in Orlando.
- A startup venture is restoring Hall, Riblet and Heron-Poma chairs for sale online.
- Snow King Mountain says the outcome of a rent dispute with the Town of Jackson could affect its ability to replace Summit with a gondola.
- Afton Alps ditches Lift 8, a 1969 Heron triple, for a terrain park.
- Re: Saddleback sale, an investigative report by the Portland, Maine NBC station concludes, “the money isn’t there” and “the deal could fall apart entirely.”
- Killington switches from a James Niehues-painted trail map to a VistaMap this year; Whiteface and Belleayre ditch VistaMap for Kevin Mastin paintings. Gunstock goes from a computer-generated map to a James Niehues one and Mt. Snow does the opposite.
- The first lift sporting Leitner Ropeways’ new station design is almost finished.
- A county supervisor in San Diego who gets gondolas does a great interview about them.
- Aspen-affiliated KSL resort group to have a name by Christmas, launch a new pass product next year and continue participating in the Mountain Collective.
- Doppelmayr releases fiscal 2016/17 global results: project count up 2.9 percent to 106, employee headcount up 1.8 percent to 2,720, revenue down 4 percent to €801 million ($948 million.)
- T minus 14 days ’til Vail Resorts reveals preliminary lift plans for next year.
Lift 1 at Loveland to Go High-Speed Next Year
America’s third largest ski resort remaining without a detachable lift will take the plunge next year. The Clear Creek Courant reports Loveland will remove and replace Lift 1 with a detachable quad chair in 2018. An eight minute ride on the current 1981 Yan will drop to just three minutes, Chief Operating Officer Rob Goodell told the Clear Creek County Commission on November 14th. “One of the driving forces was the next generation of the Loveland family, the kids and the grand kids,” he said. “We’re very much looking toward the future because this lift is going to be there for 40 years.” No word yet on a manufacturer but Leitner-Poma has built every new lift at Loveland since 1996.
News Roundup: Resources
- Amid zip line dispute, Peak Resorts threatens to close Hidden Valley, remove five chairlifts and sell the land to a residential developer.
- “I’m very confident we’re going to have new resources we haven’t had in previous years,” Steamboat COO says of Crown/KSL ownership. Deer Valley President and COO Bob Wheaton makes similar comments in Park City.
- Saddleback sale to Australian firm still hasn’t closed.
- Bear Valley’s six-pack looks great in green and now has a name: Mokelumne Express.
- Who says detachable terminals must be symmetrical? Leitner experiments in Europe.
- T-Bar area in Edmonton, Alberta shuts down.
- At the end of a tough year, Granby Ranch goes up for sale.
- New Heavenly trail map confirms Galaxy won’t spin again this season, leaving a big hole in Nevada.
- Epic Passes account for 43 percent of Vail Resorts revenue.
- New lifts at the Yellowstone Club get names: Eglise, Great Bear and Little Dipper. A few hundred families now enjoy the 14th largest lift fleet in the country.
News Roundup: Under the Radar
- Chinese investment firm acquires a majority stake in Swiss ropeway manufacturer BMF, which also owns Gangloff.
- Wolf Creek will build a third high-speed quad called Meadow in 2018.
- Aspen Skiing Company settles with a woman who sued after falling in the loading area of the Village Express.
- Private operator of Val Bialas Ski Center in New York resigns, citing continued financial losses. The publicly-owned mountain has a 1973 Borvig.
- Check out these architectural drawings of Disney World’s Skyliner gondola network.
- No real news but this recent drone video shows the current state of lifts and why Saddleback is worth saving.
- The Skytracs in St. Maarten open this week and are expected to draw some 135,000 cruise passengers a year.
- Here’s a Mt. Spokane expansion construction update.
- Adanac Ski Hill in Ontario replaced its 1950s Poma double with an Alpen Star quad this summer, bringing Doppelmayr to 15 new lifts for 2017 in North America.
News Roundup: Following
- Mt. Hood Meadows, Skytrac and Timberline Helicopters fly Buttercup towers in just 45 minutes.
- Vail Resorts schedules annual meeting for Wednesday, December 6th, where multiple new lift projects are likely to be revealed.
- Aspen Skiing Company, the City of Aspen, private landowners and the public collaborate towards building a long-sought detachable Lift 1.
- Latest LST detach update: chairs are back at the factory being reworked and the Envers lift is expected to be up and running around Christmas.
- Revelstoke adds 24 new gondola cabins, Crystal Mountain gets five more.
- Navajo Nation leadership soundly rejects Grand Canyon Escalade gondola in 16-2 vote.
- SkiCo and the Aspen Valley Ski & Snowboard Club plan to build a platter surface lift on the skier’s right side of Golden Horn at Aspen Highlands next summer.
- There’s an unconfirmed rumor that the Cyclone at Sunrise Park, AZ won’t operate this winter. The 1983 Yan is North America’s longest triple chair at 7,982′ with 32 towers and 352 chairs. I’ve reached out to Sunrise for comment and will update if I hear anything.
- Montana Snowbowl’s TV Mountain expansion won’t open this season.
- After building three new lifts in a row, the Hermitage Club finds itself in a cash flow crunch.
News Roundup: 2019
- Valemount Glacier Destinations says it’s in talks with both Leitner-Poma and Doppelmayr for construction of phase one lifts in 2018-19.
- SE Group to present nine alignment options for a new Lift 1A on Aspen Mountain.
- La Paz breaks ground on its 17th and 18th gondolas, set to open in 2019.
- The Saddleback sale still hasn’t closed and an update suggests a shift in focus from building new lifts to reopening with a limited number of existing ones.
- Here’s a great rundown of Sigma’s new Symphony 10 gondola cabin, which complements the Diamond series.
- In surprise announcement, Teton Pass says it won’t open this winter. This awesome but remote Montana resort has a 1973 SLI double and a number of used chairlifts in the parking lot for possible expansion.
- New Zealand’s longest chairlift will reopen December 5th, nine months after a wildfire burned chairs and ruined the haul rope.
- Forest Service releases draft draft Environmental Assessment for Alta’s Baldy tram, Flora lift and Wildcat/Sunnyside replacement projects. Final public comment is now open.
- World’s largest gold producer proposes building a ski resort with up to 18 lifts on a former mine site near Hope, BC.
- The Economist looks at why Latin American countries build so many urban gondolas.
- The Grand Canyon Escalade bill goes before the Navajo Nation Council on Tuesday and needs a two-thirds majority to pass.
- Squaw Alpine names 13,000-foot interconnect gondola California Express, plans 2019 opening.
News Roundup: High Level
- The Denver Post talks details with Dave Perry, head of the new KSL-Crown Family resort company.
- James Coleman is buying Elk Ridge, Arizona and plans to build a chairlift.
- Nonprofit operator of Cape Smokey in Nova Scotia seeks private investor to revive a mothballed 1995 quad chair.
- T-Bar mania continues in New England as Ascutney proposes installing a 2,500′ Doppelmayr from Le Relais.
- Man falls from the Black Mountain Express on Arapahoe Basin’s opening day.
- Tram board finds insufficient evidence to act against Granby Ranch for allegedly leaving a child on a chairlift years ago.
- Granby also moves forward with replacing Quickdraw’s drive.
- Eldora takes local media on a tour of Alpenglow.
- Sometime after I took pictures of the Basin quad at White Pass, a wacky offset half tower was added.
- Groundbreaking at The Balsams is delayed yet again.
- The private owner of the former High Pond Ski Area in Vermont is installing a new Leitner-Poma T-Bar on the site.
- In a podcast interview, chief of Canada’s third largest transit agency says high-level talks are underway toward building the Burnaby Mountain Gondola.
- Purgatory seeks approval to build a 4,200′ lift called Gelande to the south of Needles next summer.
News Roundup: Dire
- Hemlock Mountain, BC re-brands as Sasquatch Mountain and eyes a high-speed quad to replace Skyline.
- Vail Resorts’ fiscal 2017 net income rose 40.6 percent and skier visits 20.1 percent over 2016 with Epic Pass pass sales trending 17 percent higher for 2017-18.
- Och-Ziff sells Mountain High back to previous ownership group.
- Frost Fire, ND won’t open this winter, citing the “dire” condition of its triple chairlift. The nonprofit mountain estimates $1.35 million is needed to buy a replacement. The statement makes no mention of the mountain’s other lift, a double chair with Poma components.
- Sugarloaf’s five year plan would turn the SuperQuad into a SuperSix in 2019, move the CTEC Stealth to Timberline and add a T-Bar to Brackett Basin in 2021.
- Kevin Mastin paints a new trail map for Whiteface.
- Belleayre’s gondola will feature a new rack design for snowboards and skis of different sizes.
- Steamboat Resort won’t operate Howelsen Hill.
- Resorts grapple with whether service dogs should ride chairlifts.
- Allen Peak Tram’s new tower is in at Snowbasin.
- Doppelmayr’s latest Wir magazine features Oakland’s new gondola and more.
News Roundup: Retirements
- Telluride weighs building at least one big detachable next summer as the Forest Service tentatively approves replacements for Plunge, Sunshine Express and Village Express.
- White Pass, WA retires its platter in favor of a 380’ carpet.
- LiftDigital goes live for testing at Winter Park.
- Taos says goodbye to two more chairlifts – that’s four in one summer!
- Song Mountain, NY is replacing its 1965 Thunderbird T-Bar with a chairlift.
Anyone know where it’s from? - The Rainforest Adventures crew gets one Skytrac back in action and works to repair the other following Irma’s devastation of St. Maarten.
- Scroll through these photos of a new high-speed quad in Switzerland with four stations, three sections, two haul ropes and only one drive!
- Albany gondola group to be led by former chief executive of the New York State Department of Transportation and Federal Highway Administration Thomas Madison, Jr.
- Authorities briefly seize Granby Ranch, site of last season’s fatal lift incident, over delinquent taxes.
- Spout Springs in Oregon won’t open for a second year in a row and remains for sale.
- Mi Teleférico’s Orange Line did 93,847 riders its first weekend.
- Frank F. sent over these photos of the new Skytrac Buttercup Quad going in at Mt. Hood Meadows:
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