- Berkshire Bank seeks to foreclose on the Hermitage Club, saying the private ski area owes $16.6 million on $17.1 million in loans taken out between 2014 and 2017.
- Hunter Mountain apologizes to season pass holders and explains in detail why two of its lifts went down for much of Presidents’ Week.
- Mt. Snow’s Bluebird Express is down with a damaged gearbox.
- Similar story for Cypress Mountain’s Lions Express, which reopened on Tuesday.
- Harmony at Whistler also went down for much of last week..
- Big Sky’s Six Shooter was rope evacuated last week, sparking an interesting conversation about why that lift turns a few degrees.
- HeliOps profiles Brian Jorgenson of Timberline Helicopters, who explains why even at $1.50 per second, the UH-60 Black Hawk has become the gold standard for western ski lift missions.
- The largest urban gondola system in North America will open this May in Santo Domingo, capital of the Dominican Republic.
- Boston’s proposed Seaport gondola has a new route.
- A conference center in Wisconsin called Forest Springs plans to expand its ski area with a new chairlift.
- Silver Star’s new gondola is on track for a rare July opening with the top terminal and all foundations complete.
News
Windham Mountain Announces Six-Pack for 2018-19
A base-to-summit six-passenger chairlift is coming to Windham Mountain in the Catskill Mountains of New York. The mile-long Doppelmayr system will replace the Whistler triple, a 1983 VonRoll triple with a ten-plus minute ride. A parallel detachable quad called Whirlwind, built by Garaventa CTEC in 1993, will remain in place at least through this summer. Windham also revealed today it will launch RFID ticketing across its seven lifts next season and Doppelmayr now has at least a dozen lifts to build in the United States and Canada this year.
The Catskill region has seen a number of big new lifts recently, including a gondola at Belleayre and six-pack at nearby Hunter Mountain. Peak Resorts could build another new high-speed lift at Hunter in 2018, raising the bar for the entire region. Windham’s announcement comes after two very quiet months for new lift news, with hopefully a bunch more to come this spring.
News Roundup: Ahead
- Doppelmayr and CWA unveil world’s most luxurious gondola cabin with air conditioning, a fridge and more powered by carriage wheel generators.
- The five chairlift Hermitage Club lays off 50 to 80 employees and cuts ski operations to weekends only, a result of significant financial challenges.
- Children fall from lifts at West Mountain and Windham Mountain.
- 2022 Winter Olympics host China is up to an impressive 236 ski areas with at least one chairlift.
- Woodward Park City remains in limbo pending the outcome of three appeals.
- Theme park projects such as the Doppelmayr-supplied Hogwarts Express and Disney Skyliner drive record revenue for PCL Construction of Edmonton.
- There was a deropement followed by partial rope evac of the triple chair at Red Lodge Mountain over Presidents’ weekend.
- Apres Vous at Jackson Hole was evacuated yesterday following a gearbox issue.
- Sunday River reveals why it takes 3.5 hours to put cabins back on the Chondola after a windstorm.
- Here’s more construction eye candy from Disney World.
- Stella, the only six-pack in Idaho, was named and themed by a former Disney imagineer.
- Catch up on the upcoming season pass battle and what else lies ahead for Alterra with company President Dave Perry.
- Speaking of the Ikon Pass, it now includes 400 lifts with new partners Revelstoke, Sugarbush, Sunshine Village, Lake Louise and Mt. Norquay for $899.
News Roundup: Stories
- Group eyes gondolas for Miami.
- Alaska’s upcoming new ski resort gets a name: Skeetawk.
- Doppelmayr joins Facebook.
- Italian snowmaking powerhouse Technoalpin enters the ski lift fray with a T-Bar in Turkey.
- Lookout Pass says 14 new runs will be cut this summer but new lifts will wait until 2019.
- Durango, Colorado advances plan to replace rope tows on Chapman Hill with a carpet and triple chair.
- Two of Hunter Mountain’s three summit lifts are down for the third day in a row.
- This week’s rope evacuation stories come from Blue Mountain (2000 Poma six-pack) and Giants Ridge (2017 Skytrac quad.)
https://www.facebook.com/BlueMtnResort/posts/10156115158282603
News Roundup: On the Block
- Alterra’s David Perry says significant capital is likely be spent at Steamboat in 2018 and 2019 with phase two of the gondola rebuild and other big projects on the table.
- A Denver TV reporter heads to Texas for a two-part interview with the husband of Kelly Huber, the woman killed during a lift malfunction last year at Granby Ranch.
- Two loaded chairs collide at Owl’s Head, Quebec after the Green Chair was pressed into rare operation amid downtime on a neighboring high-speed quad. The 1972 Heron-Poma is the former Big Hitch lift from Stagecoach, Colorado.
- China Peak’s owner wishes he still had the $900,000 he spent to build a new lift last summer that can’t open with no snow.
- The new Peak triple was rope evac’d at Pats Peak last Monday, apparently due to a gearbox issue.
- Poma dedicates its newest factory in France.
- Disney Skyliner’s first tower is up and it’s tapered in the cool Wolfurt style.
- Ian Cumming, founder of Powdr and majority owner of Snowbird, dies at age 77.
- Granite Gorge’s chairlift opens for the season after a gearbox issue and other problems.
- Ariel Quiros officially settles with the Securities and Exchange Commission for $82 million, paving the way for the sale of Jay Peak and Burke Mountain.
- The world’s longest lift is open!
- Killington formally applies to replace the South Ridge triple with a quad chair, manufacturer unknown. The sample profile confusingly shows a Poma Alpha drive and Doppelmayr Eclipse return terminal.
- Teton Pass, Montana won’t reopen under current ownership and is up for sale.
- Skier visits have declined 30 percent in South Korea over the last five years and there are several lost ski resorts in the Olympic region.
- The Sawtooth National Forest tentatively approves Sun Valley’s project to replace the Cold Springs lift with a longer high-speed quad as soon as this summer.
- A chairlift will be studied studied for one of Alabama’s most popular state parks.
- Alterra names Mammoth veteran Rusty Gregory as the company’s first CEO.
News Roundup: Firsts
- One of Doppelmayr’s largest customers will open its first Poma gondola on February 7th.
- Leitner lift with new Pininfarina terminal design launches in Austria.
- Woodward Park City faces not one but three appeals.
- After more than a year of delays and false starts, LST’s first detachable opens again in France.
- The Balsams eyes April gondola groundbreaking.
- Telluride quits the Mountain Collective to join the Epic Pass, bringing together 14 Vail Resorts-owned mountains with two partner resorts.
- Sugar Mountain settles with the family of a boy seriously injured after jumping from a stopped chairlift two hours after it closed.
- Georgetown-Rosslyn Gondola project inches forward.
- Ascutney Outdoors raises most of the money needed to install a used T-Bar this summer.
Lifts to Look for in PyeongChang
The Olympics have become a boon for ski lift companies, which often supply tens or even hundreds of millions of dollars in new lifts in the run up to each Games. Most recently for Sochi’s 2014 venues, Doppelmayr built a staggering 40 ropeways including multiple tricable gondolas that could even carry cars in the event of road closures. Poma built another $137 million worth – 16 lifts – the most concurrently at a single area in company history. Even summer host cities often feature ropeways that I’d like to think contributed to them being chosen as hosts in the first place. Transport for London and Doppelmayr launched the Emirates Air Line just in time for the 2012 games and Rio de Janeiro debuted multiple urban gondolas in the run up to 2016.
Jeongseon
The 2018 games kick off February 9th in and around PyeongChang, South Korea. Three ski resorts will host alpine events just 125 miles from where North Korean dictator Kim Jong-Un opened his own new ski resort with a gondola and four chairlifts in 2013. The South’s democratic government has constructed a similar facility from scratch to host the downhill and super-G events, called Jeongseon Alpine Centre. Doppelmayr supplied a unique two-section gondola in 2015 and added additional two high-speed quad lifts in 2016. This is notable because there are really only two runs! One of the chairlifts is very similar to the temporary Timing Flats high-speed quad at Whistler, which simply ferried foot passengers from the base area to finish plaza during the 2010 Games and was moved to Sunshine Village after just two weeks of public use.
The two-section Jeongseon Downhill Gondola is powered by a single 857 horsepower motor and services the entire 2,707 vertical-foot men’s downhill course. A stacked bullwheel at the lift’s angle station has two grooves for the two different haul ropes. After some delays with site prep, the gondola was built by multiple crews in just three months from November 2015 to February 2016, just before an IOC deadline. The finish line at Jeongseon sits at only 1,788 feet above sea level and a 4,500 gallon-per-minute snowmaking system was also built here. The venue receives little natural snowfall and has been criticized for its ecological impact and questionable future as a public facility.
Game-Changing Ikon Pass to Launch with 23 Mountain Resorts
Alterra Mountain Company dropped a bomb at the Outdoor Retailer/SIA show this morning, announcing the forthcoming Ikon Pass will bring together its dozen North American resorts along with eleven other major mountains. Aspen Skiing Company, Boyne Resorts, Powdr Co. and more have partnered with Alterra to add destinations such as Aspen Snowmass, Alta, Snowbird, Big Sky, Killington and Jackson Hole. “The Ikon Pass is a collaboration of like-minded mountain destinations across North America where incredible terrain, unique character and local traditions are celebrated,” said Erik Forsell, Chief Marketing Officer for Alterra Mountain Company. “We’ve curated a community of iconic destinations. We believe this new pass offers tremendous opportunity and appeal to mountain enthusiasts who have a passion for outdoor adventure.”
Pass options will range from a set number of days at varying destinations to an ultimate, unlimited season pass. I can’t stress enough how much this changes big mountain skiing in North America. For years now, Vail Resorts’ Epic Pass has been the largest and most successful season pass product in the world, now offering access to 272 lifts and 44,000 acres at 15 mountains in North America and Australia to some 750,000 passholders. Ikon will one-up Vail’s terrain offering with access to 23 top-tier North American resorts, a ridiculous 363 lifts and 48,840 acres (for both passes, I am counting gondolas, chairlifts and surface lifts with towers. If carpets and rope tows are included, the Epic Pass offers 340 lifts while Ikon has 434.)
Ikon Pass resorts for 2018-19 will be:
- Alta, Utah
- Alpine Meadows, California
- Aspen Highlands, Colorado
- Aspen Mountain, Colorado
- Bear Mountain, California
- Blue Mountain, Ontario
- Big Sky, Montana
- Buttermilk, Colorado
- Copper Mountain, Colorado
- Deer Valley, Utah
- Eldora, Colorado
- Jackson Hole, Wyoming
- June Mountain, California
- Killington, Vermont
- Loon Mountain, New Hampshire
- Mammoth Mountain, California
- Snowbird, Utah
- Snowmass, Colorado
- Snowshoe, West Virginia
- Snow Summit, California
- Squaw Valley, California
- Steamboat, Colorado
- Stratton, Vermont
- Sugarloaf, Maine
- Sunday River, Maine
- Tremblant, Quebec
- Winter Park, Colorado
Ikon passholders will also receive discounts and special offers at CMH heli-skiing in British Columbia. Epic holders already enjoy limited access to 30 European resorts. The Liftopia-powered Mountain Collective Pass, which allows destination skiers to sample many large resorts, will remain an option in its current form and also go on sale in March. The M.A.X. Pass, founded by Intrawest, Powdr and Boyne, will sunset. Specific Ikon tiers and prices will be released in the coming weeks.
As an employee of one of the independent resorts on the MCP and now Ikon Pass, I watched first hand the worry of consolidation last spring turn to optimism in the fall. Now I know why.
News Roundup: Eruption
- Move over Epic Pass, Alterra is launching the Ikon Pass.
- Granby Ranch is officially listed for sale.
- Aspen CEO Mike Kaplan says snow challenges bring out the best in people.
- Think your area is busy on a Saturday? The urban gondola network in La Paz sets a new one day record: 278,621 riders!
- New York Governor calls previously announced state fair gondola “an exciting idea” but withholds funding for now.
- More stories surface of the Hermitage Club owing people money.
- Skier records volcano erupting from a Doppelmayr detachable in Japan. One person was killed and a gondola damaged by rockfall.
- ORDA, the state owner of Belleayre, Gore Mountain and Whiteface, lost $20.8 million last year.
- Powder catches up with Alterra President and COO David Perry, who stresses the company will do things differently than Vail.
- Public comment period opens for Mt. Rose’s Atoma expansion, which would include construction of one or two new chairlifts as early as 2019.
- The draft environmental impact statement is also out for Steamboat’s expansion, to include a second gondola, Rough Rider chairlift, new Bashor lift and Pioneer Ridge pod with groundbreaking possible by May.
- Lake Louise and Nakiska are probable venues for a possible 2026 Calgary Olympics. Denver, Reno-Tahoe and Salt Lake also weigh bids.
- Just upgrading electric infrastructure for Disney’s Skyliner gondola system will cost $3.8 million, around the total price tag of a typical ski lift project!
- For the first time since I started keeping track, 2018 new lifts are pacing behind 2017.
News Roundup: Study
- SAM reports almost all of North America’s ski industry had a difficult Christmas but things are improving.
- Pictures of a severed gondola cable from a Chamonix storm are incredible (reminder: the lift was not operating.)
- Through January 8th, Vail Resorts skier visits are pacing 10.8 percent below last season and non-Vail-owned Colorado resorts are down 13 percent.
- Gunstock rope evacuates 27 guests from the Silver Medal lift.
- A federal judge dismisses a lawsuit filed by a woman who broke her femur unloading the Discovery lift at Keystone.
- Colorado sides with Winter Park and rules that service dogs don’t necessarily belong on chairlifts.
- SAM‘s inaugural Summit Series piece brings together industry heavy-hitters and future leaders and not surprisingly, the first two stories quoted involve lifts!
- USFS and Doppelmayr veteran Michael Lane will succeed Sid Roslund as NSAA’s Director of Technical Services.
- Electrical fire damages Oakland Zoo’s skyride.
- A wall of mud partially buries the new Lightning Express at Marble Mountain.
- The Forest Service accepts Aspen Mountain’s master plan update including the construction of a Pandora detachble quad, removal of Gent’s Ridge and shortening of Bell Mountain. 1A study continues.
- The end is in sight for a significant midwinter repair to Fernie’s White Pass quad.
- Colorado Passenger Tramway Safety Board releases its investigation report on the carpet entanglement death of Loveland mechanic Adam Lee.
- Winter Park calls response to digital restraining bar displays “amazingly positive” and they may be deployed on other lifts and at more Alterra resorts.
- Mt. Spokane wisely opts to use the Riblet it purchased from Bridger Bowl for spare parts and is now soliciting bids for a brand new triple chair for this summer’s expansion.
