Statistics

Breaking Down the Building Boom of 2022

Peter Landsman25 Comments
The 2.4 mile Base to Base Gondola connected Alpine Meadows and Olympic Valley following two years of construction and decades of dreaming.

North American lift construction reached a 23 year high in 2023 with 66 installations from California to Maine and British Columbia to Nova Scotia. Not only did 2022 see the largest number of projects since 1999, it was likely the biggest lift investment year ever in dollars. While there’s no way to know exactly how much all the lifts cost, it’s safe to say the new gondolas, bubble chairs and fixed grip quads built this year total hundreds of millions. Amazingly, this feat was accomplished amid immense supply chain and labor challenges and without three large projects postponed at Park City and Keystone. A few lifts remain in final stages of construction this New Year’s Eve but will be completed in the first weeks of 2023 and spin for decades to come.

Rip’s Ride was the very first of 18 Epic Lift Upgrade projects to open this season.

Vail Resorts realized an incredible 18 new lifts at 12 resorts for the 2022-23 season, the largest-ever investment by the firm and probably any company in North American ski history. Boyne Resorts also went big with multiple eight place installations and a half dozen projects total as it continued renewing lift fleets across its ten resort portfolio. Five year old Alterra Mountain Company launched giant new gondolas at Palisades Tahoe and Steamboat with more big projects in the pipeline for 2023.

Jordan 8 became the fourth eight place chairlift in the United States at Sunday River, Maine.

While this year’s class spans coast to coast, a few geographic hot spots accounted for the bulk of new lifts. I have already travelled to Lake Tahoe four times this season thanks to new lift openings at five different resorts (and plentiful snow!) Five different resorts in the Wasatch also added new lifts, a number lower than originally planned due to the unfortunate cancellation of Park City’s two projects. As always, Colorado was an epicenter with not one but two new lifts at both Steamboat and Vail plus one offs at Arapahoe Basin, Loveland and Telluride.

Skytrac had its biggest year ever for complete lifts with 10 projects on top of relocations and retrofits.

In the Midwest, the big story was Michigan where Boyne Mountain debuted the region’s first eight place detachable, Caberfae expanded onto South Peak and Bittersweet debuted a second high speed quad. In the east, the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania nearly matched Colorado’s number of new lifts, a whopping five of which went in at Vail-owned Jack Frost and Big Boulder. Camelback Resort and Blue Mountain nearly doubled the state’s number of six packs overnight. Four of six New England states saw new construction with three new lifts each in Vermont, New Hampshire and Maine. Canada had a relatively quiet year aside from Whistler, where Vail Resorts and Doppelmayr built the two largest lifts of the year by vertical transport feet per hour.

The Gray Butte Quad at Mt. Shasta Ski Park adds to the ski area’s vertical and terrain offering for the 2022-23 season.

There weren’t just a lot of lifts this year but a lot of big lifts. 2022 saw the highest percentage of detachable equipment since at least 1999, when four different companies competed in the space. After decades with only Doppelmayr and Leitner-Poma in the North American detachable market, MND Ropeways completed its first North American detachable at Waterville Valley this year in partnership with Bartholet. With a capacity of 3,000 skiers per hour and 1,600 foot vertical rise, the Tecumseh Express is one of the largest installations of the year by any manufacturer.

Waterville Valley’s Tecumseh Express, a bubble six pack built by MND Ropeways.

Fixed grip triples and quads remained popular this year with a solid 26 installations. Gondolas also reached a Covid-era high while surface lifts and trams took a back seat.

Exciting lift-served expansions opened across the West as 2022 came to a close. A D-Line six pack at Grand Targhee unlocked 500 new acres on Peaked Mountain and a quad chair at Lookout Pass opened another 500 acres on Eagle Peak. A new quad at Mt. Shasta services 250 new acres on Gray Butte and another fixed quad accesses 40 acres of new terrain at at Sundance Resort. Utah Olympic Park also completed a major expansion to its training facilities with a high speed quad on West Peak.

Grand Targhee’s new Colter detachable six pack opened in November on Peaked Mountain.

Despite the entrance of MND and niche installations by Partek and SkyTrans, the HTI Group and Doppelmayr remain locked in a fierce duopoly in North America, mirroring their positions globally. HTI’s Leitner-Poma and Skytrac constructed a combined 26 lifts in this corner of the world while Doppelmayr managed 30. Together those represent 95 percent market share.

Steamboat’s new Wild Blue Gondola features 10 passengers cabins and the largest diameter haul rope of any lift in North America.

Interestingly HTI continues to offer two different fixed grip product lines (Skytrac Monarch and Leitner-Poma Alpha) while Doppelmayr has two detachable families with D-Line and UNI G. This was the largest year ever for D-Line with five installations and more planned for next year.

Covid turned into a boon for the ski industry and 65 of 66 projects were at ski resorts. For all the talk of urban gondolas and point of interest projects, skiing remains nearly synonymous with the lift business. An outfit called SkyLand Ranch near Gatlinburg, Tennessee saw the lone non-skiing installation for 2022. So far only one of next year’s project is non-skiing at a California winery.

Saddleback Mountain self-installed a new beginner quad supplied by Partek.
After a few year hiatus, the Leitner-Poma Alpha returned in 2022 with installations at Loveland, Cascade Mountain and Wasatch Peaks Ranch.

Lift Blog also enjoyed a growth year with more than 800,000 unique visitors viewing 4.3 million pages – an average of 12,000 per day. As great as 2022 was, 2023 will be even better. With early orders in hand, manufacturers are ramping up to build at least 60 projects ranging from the first D-Lines in Canada to a large aerial tramway and the longest gondola in North America. Keystone’s Bergman Bowl expansion will finally be realized along with expansions at Aspen Mountain, Schweitzer, Steamboat, Loon Mountain and Sugarloaf. There are also a number of big lifts on order which have not been publicly announced yet. You can bet I will cover them all and hope you will join me. Happy New Year.

Jackson Hole and Leitner-Poma partnered to upgrade the Thunder lift from a fixed grip quad to a detachable quad with contour loading and unloading.

Celebrating a Year of Resilience

Peter Landsman18 Comments
Atlantic Canada’s first gondola debuted in the Fall to rave reviews.

As clocks roll over to 2022, 42 new lifts stand tall across North America. Lift manufacturer and resort employees accomplished a lot – operating through the pandemic and adding 13 more lifts than the year before despite supply chain bottlenecks and record low unemployment. Nearly all pandemic-postponed projects from 2020 were completed thanks to skiers, mountain bikers and sightseers flocking outside this year.

Holiday Valley debuted its fourth detachable quad this season.

The 2021 lift class ranges from used T-Bars to the East’s first eight place chairlift and three new gondolas. Vail Resorts purchased the most new lifts of any single customer with seven projects across five mountains. Okemo moved a bubble detachable quad from Jackson Gore to the summit and added a six pack in its place. At Beaver Creek, a high alpine expansion will soon debut with two new quad chairs. Just as Vail’s construction projects entered the home stretch in September, the company shocked the industry and announced 19 new lifts would be built across its network in 2022. That number grew even further this month with the addition of two more projects in Pennsylvania as part of the Epic Lift Upgrade.

Okemo’s new Quantum Six, a partnership between Leitner-Poma and Vail Resorts.

Boyne Resorts moved forward with two signature Doppelmayr D-Line lifts at Loon Mountain and Big Sky Resort. Boyne also worked to open a new peak at Sunday River dubbed Merrill Hill, serviced by a Sunday River Red triple chair. Seeing how smoothly its pandemic-postponed projects went, Boyne went ahead and announced three 2022 lifts early for Boyne Mountain, Loon Mountain and Sunday River.

Merrill Hill at Sunday River awaits its inaugural season.

No new lifts debuted at Alterra mountains this year but the growing company’s pause won’t last long. Leitner-Poma completed the towers and terminal foundations for the Base-to-Base Gondola, which will be one of the most unique lifts in America when complete next year at Palisades Tahoe. The project includes four stations, three haul ropes, more than 30 towers and a cabin storage facility. Alterra also has grand plans for new lifts at Steamboat including North America’s longest gondola.

The existing Steamboat Gondola received a new bottom terminal in 2021 to make room for a second, longer gondola to be built nearby in 2022.

This year’s projects were dispersed all across the US and Canada with particular strength in the traditional Rocky Mountain and Northeast markets.

While large ski areas went big on lifts, small ski areas invested too. This new Skytrac belongs to the Steamboat town hill.

2021 saw a roughly even split between fixed and detachable lifts with both increasing from last year. Gondolas took a slight pandemic pause again but will be back in a big way next year with Palisades Tahoe, Steamboat, Whistler all planning large installations. No resorts built aerial tramways in 2021 but two new surface lifts debuted.

Loon Mountain’s new flagship eight place bubble, dubbed Kancamagus 8.

Fifteen years ago, around half of new lifts were for expansions while the other half replaced older ropeways. The share of replacement equipment has only grown, making up nearly three quarters of all projects this year. We said goodbye to many lifts from defunct manufacturers in 2021 with 12 Halls, 6 Borvigs and 3 Heron-Pomas being retired this year.

The detachable business split right down the middle with Leitner-Poma and Doppelmayr each completing eight lifts. Things will get interesting next year when MND Ropeways completes its first US detachable at Waterville Valley in partnership with Swiss manufacturer Bartholet. The last time three firms competed in the detachable space Amazon only sold books.

The fixed grip side of the business also split roughly evenly with Skytrac edging out Doppelmayr. Skytrac fabricated eight complete lifts plus two retrofit Monarch drive terminals, the most projects ever in one year for the company. Doppelmayr’s Alpenstar model continued to be popular with seven installations.

Snow King Mountain transformed this summer with a new gondola, backside expansion and summit learning center.

We saw the ski industry recover faster from the pandemic than other segments of the travel and tourism world. Only two installations were at places other than ski areas in 2020 and 2021, both gondolas at the Icy Strait Pont cruise port in Southeast Alaska.

The percentage of lifts installed used remained low this year with just seven reinstallations. Most customers opted for brand new machines from four different manufacturers.

Doppelmayr won the total project count with 18 installations while the Leitner-Poma/Skytrac duo installed 16. Partek completed a new quad chair at Trollhaugen, Wisconsin after a on-off year with no projects in 2020.

The new Cannon Valley Quad at Minnesota’s Welch Village.

Projects in 2021 were incredibly diverse, from the tiniest platter at a new Club Med in Quebec to Big Sky’s Swift Current 6, the longest D-Line chairlift in the world. The below chart shows Leitner-Poma and Skytrac roughly split their business of large lifts and small lifts while Doppelmayr covered the entire gamut of Vertical Transport Feet per Hour under one roof.

The lift companies enjoyed a great year and so did Lift Blog. A record 617,000 people visited this website in 2021 and viewed 3.6 million pages. Next year I should finally finish visiting every US ski area, a milestone I’ve been chasing since I was four years old. There’s so much to look forward to in the lift world in 2022 and I hope you follow along as I do my best to cover it all. Happy New Year!

Doppelmayr Posts Pandemic Sales Decline

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We now know how much the first 12 months of the Covid-19 pandemic impacted the tourism-reliant Doppelmayr Garaventa Group. Revenue declined 12.5 percent to €763 million ($891 million) for the 2020/21 fiscal year, which began concurrently with pandemic lockdowns and ran through March of this year. “Tourism in particular took a major global hit,” said Thomas Pichler, managing director of Doppelmayr Holding SE in the company’s annual report. “The uncertainties our customers were confronted with led to a slump in contracts and the postponement of calls to tender and orders throughout the ropeway industry. The repercussions will continue to make themselves felt in the next few years.”

Doppelmayr Garaventa downsized its global workforce by about 200 employees during the fiscal year. “In spite of all our efforts to absorb the financial fallout of the Covid-19 pandemic, we had to adjust personnel levels in line with the changed circumstances last fall,” said Pichler. “That was a painful but unfortunately necessary step. We are well equipped for the next few years with a committed team who stand by our customers with a solution-focused mindset.”

Even though sales reached the lowest level in nine years, the firm celebrated some major successes. For the upcoming 2022 Winter Olympic Games in Beijing, its teams built nine installations in the new ski resort of Yanqing. A gondola in Zermatt became the first autonomous ropeway in Switzerland and the trailblazing Eiger Express 3S opened last December. A large urban D-Line system was also completed in Mexico City.

In United States and Canada, Doppelmayr completed 10 ropeways in calendar year 2020, down from 25 the year before. The two countries accounted for 13 percent of global revenue, a decrease from 17 percent in 2019/20. As readers of this blog know, the three largest North American resort operators postponed all their lift projects while many independent operators continued forward with theirs. This year most of Alterra, Vail and Boyne’s postponed projects are being completed and Doppelmayr’s US/Canada project count will reach at least 17 for 2021.

Despite setbacks, Doppelmayr sees reason for optimism with particular strength emerging in two markets. “Our customers in Asia and North America are investing and setting course for a successful future with cutting-edge ropeway infrastructure from Doppelmayr,” notes the report. “We are therefore looking to the future with confidence and continuing to pursue our goal of working with our customers to build the best ropeways in the world. Global tourism will recover and people will once again experience unforgettable moments in the mountains and other special places.”

Reflecting on a Year Like No Other

Peter Landsman9 Comments

At this time last year, 2020 was destined to be busy in North America with more than 30 ropeways already scheduled for construction. As the 2019/20 winter went on, more announcements came seemingly each week. Vail Resorts, Alterra and Boyne all unveiled ambitious plans including multi-lift projects at Beaver Creek, Mammoth and Okemo. Yet in the background, the Coronavirus was advancing around the world. The situation came to a head the weekend of March 14th, when hundreds of North American resorts closed in order to protect public health. Facing uncertainty about summer and beyond, many businesses decided to postpone expansion capital entirely.

Despite immense challenges, US and Canadian resorts did add a total of 28 new lifts in 2020. Most companies which went ahead were small- to medium-sized, ones often forgotten in this era of consolidation. In Maine and West Virginia, mountains which had sat idle for years revved back to life with brand new lifts to welcome back guests.

Saddleback, Maine’s new Rangeley quad replaced a Mueller double which was no longer operable.

Almost all this year’s lifts directly replaced older machines. The average age of a lift retired in 2020 was 40 years as resorts said goodbye to Halls, Riblets, Borvigs and more. Some replacement projects simply couldn’t wait for the pandemic to be over.

Expansion lifts make up about 40 percent of the total most years but in 2020 they were just 20 percent. Sun Valley forged ahead with Sunrise, a 380 acre addition near Seattle Ridge. After skiing the new terrain, guests will enjoy a high speed ride back to the Roundhouse on a new Doppelmayr quad. Other expansions include Lake Louise’s West Bowl project and Nordic Valley’s yet-to-be-named southward expansion.

Broadway at Sun Valley, a mile long detachable quad in a new alignment.

Arapahoe Basin replaced not one but two Yan fixed grips with modern Alpha models, including the legendary Pallavicini double with a new double. Aspen Skiing Company purchased its first direct drive lift from Leitner-Poma, a replacement for Big Burn at Snowmass. The State of New York committed millions to upgrade three fixed grip chairlifts at two mountains.

Pallavicini 2.0 at Arapahoe Basin.
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US Skier Visits Declined 13.9 Percent Last Season

Peter Landsman8 Comments

American ski resorts were on track for their fourth best season in history before coronavirus forced closures, according to data released today by the National Ski Areas Association. Spring traditionally accounts for about 20 percent of total visitation and the shortened season yielded a total of 51.1 million skier days. On the heels of 59.3 million skiers in 2018/19, 2019/20 will go down as the worst season since 2011/12 and second worst since 1991/92.

Despite visitation declining in all six NSAA regions, there is reason for optimism. “To have two years in a row potentially rank in the top five seasons ever shows the strength of the industry,” said NSAA President and CEO Kelly Pawlak, referring to the 2018/19 winter and truncated 2019/20 season. “That being said, it is astounding how quickly this season went from promising to a complete disappointment.” The impact of snowfall, traditionally a major factor in visitation, was difficult to assess this year due to many resorts ending reporting in mid-March.

The Kottke National End of Season Survey also revealed six fewer operational areas in 2019/20 with a total of 470. Each resort was open an average of only 99 days, down from 121 in the 2018/19 season. That means each resort averaged about 108,000 visits. A skier visit is defined as a skiing or snowboarding guest visiting a resort for any part of a day.

The industry group estimates COVID-19 will cost resorts at least $2 billion and as much as $5 billion depending on continued impacts during the 2020/21 season. Within weeks of closing early, many resorts opted to delay capital projects such as new lifts planned for next winter. At least nine major projects were postponed in the month of April. As of today, new lift orders are pacing almost 30 percent below last year.

Following Cancellations, How Will Lift Construction Recover?

Peter Landsman14 Comments

When Vail Resorts spelled out its suspension of operations in mid-March, the shutdown was hoped to last only a week.  Fifty days later, all 37 resorts remain shuttered and the company has borrowed more than a billion dollars to weather a possible extended recession.

Almost immediately, Vail Resorts postponed discretionary capital improvement projects including seven new chairlifts.  Vail is just one of numerous operators of lifts facing epic challenges due to COVID-19.  The impacts trickle down to suppliers, particularly global suppliers of large machinery like the Leitner Group and Doppelmayr.  While the two major lift manufacturers are of similar size and structure, their customers are incredibly diverse, from mom and pop outfits to governments, NGOs and Fortune 100 companies.

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As regular readers of this blog know, the lift business is not the same as the ski business.  Leitner-Poma, Skytrac and Doppelmayr USA have all completed projects for non-ski venues recently such as theme parks, zoos, stadiums and cruise ports.  Not only are these projects making up an increasing share of contracts, they tend to be large in scope and often include lucrative operation and maintenance deals.  Some of these non-traditional customers are in even worse shape than the ski business, more dependent on high guest densities and air travel.  Put another way, there is little chance the Walt Disney Company, Carnival Corporation or the Miami Dolphins would have signed to build their recent lift projects in today’s environment.  So-called “point of interest” projects may disappear entirely for a few years.

One bright spot could be urban transport.  The Portland Aerial Tram and Roosevelt Island Tramway have both remained operational throughout the pandemic, albeit at reduced capacity (the Portland Tram carries health care workers to three different hospitals and is about as essential as it gets.)  Large aerial tramways have been ceding market share to monocable, 2S and 3S gondolas, a trend which will probably accelerate with new personal space concerns.  With gondolas, each person or family can take their own cabin unlike on trains or buses.  There are lots of great concepts for urban gondolas in North America and infrastructure spending programs could finally get one or two off the ground.  Mexico already has a large urban gondola system in operation with two more under construction.

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A Solid Year Caps a Decade of Construction Growth

Peter Landsman13 Comments

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The mostly new Steamboat Gondola features 137 cabins travelling at a brisk six meters per second.

This year saw installation of 43 new and 7 used lifts across North America, numbers similar to the last two seasons.  43 may seem like a modest number for newly-manufactured lifts on an entire continent but that number is a 54 percent increase from the start of the decade and the highest single year total since 2004.  Only seven resorts opted to install used lifts, mostly late model fixed grip chairlifts but also a detachable quad and one T-Bar.

While 2018 saw a record number of gondolas, multiple bubble chairs and a Telemix, 2019’s projects trended smaller with 22 fixed grip chairlifts and five surface lifts.  That’s the most platters and T-Bars built in the last 15 years.  Two of them anchor terrain expansions while another two service youth racing programs.  Loading carpets were included on five new fixed quad lifts, allowing them to run at slightly faster speeds.

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The Yeti Cruiser at Sasquatch Mountain Resort was one of three new Leitner-Poma Alpha fixed grips constructed across Canada in 2019.

After two huge years, gondola construction fell to two new installations in Colorado, one in New Hampshire and pulse versions in New York and Florida.  Detachable chairlift construction was just above the decade average of ten per year.  Only one of this year’s high speed chairlifts included bubbles and another heated seats.

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Vail Resorts completed the largest-ever lift investment at Stevens Pass, purchasing two Doppelmayr quads to replace aging Riblet and Thiokol lifts.

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The Lift Business Jumped Forward in 2018

Peter Landsman23 Comments

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Vail Resorts undertook a historic $52 million lift investment on Whistler and Blackcomb Mountains, adding a two stage gondola, six pack and high speed quad for 2018-19.

With 52 new ropeways servicing ski slopes, fairgrounds and theme parks, 2018 marks the fifth straight year of lift construction growth that began in 2014.  All manufacturers did well this year and numbers were particularly strong in the Eastern United States and Canada.  With North America’s first eight passenger chairlift, pioneering double loading gondolas, the first direct drives from two manufacturers and the first D-Line detachables, 2018 will be remembered as a pivotal year for North American lift building.

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A UH-60 “Black Hawk” from Timberline Helicopters delivers lift towers at Big Sky Resort in October.

Forty three lifts were brand new this year while nine were relocated.  Killington moved two lifts to new spots on the mountain, Doppelmayr relocated high speed quads at Whistler Blackcomb and Big Sky while Skytrac reinstalled Poma fixed grips at Catamount, New York and Spider Mountain, Texas.

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I was lucky to attend the SilverStar gondola launch on a perfect day in July.

Months ago I nicknamed 2018 the year of the gondola with a record ten new installations including combination chair/gondola lifts at Bromont, Quebec and Copper, Colorado.  New gondolas sprouted coast to coast in both the United States and Canada in a year that won’t soon be repeated.

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Leitner-Poma bubble chairs destined for Killington stored safely at Pico back in October.

Bubble chairlift construction also surged with big installations this winter at Big Sky, Copper Mountain and Killington.  The new American Flyer is the longest bubble lift in the world with 182 six place chairs set to carry skiers and snowboarders very soon.  Copper, Winter Park and Big Sky’s new lifts are the first in North America with direct drives that cut gearboxes out of the equation for increased reliability.

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4.9 Miles! Lift Length Record Falls Again

Peter Landsman5 Comments

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The Hon Thom-Phu Quoc Cable Car in Vietnam is the newest of three record-length gondolas in Vietnam.  Photo credit: Fatzer AG

It’s finished!  The new longest lift in the world, spanning a ridiculous 26,000 linear feet with just six intermediate towers, is undergoing testing and will open soon off the southern tip of Vietnam.   With this latest achievement, the Doppelmayr Garaventa Group breaks its own record held since February 2, 2016 by the Fansipan Legend, a 20,755-foot 3S gondola to the highest summit in Southeast Asia.  Before these two 3S lifts launched, the lift length record belonged to the Ba Na Cable Car, a monocable gondola stretching 19,032 feet that opened on March 29, 2013 in, you guessed it, Vietnam.  With completion of the Hon Thom-Phu Quoc 3S, Da Nang-based Sun Group now operates the three longest gondolas in the world as well as the planet’s largest aerial tramway with the tallest ropeway towers.  Silver Mountain’s gondola, the world’s longest when it opened in June 1990, is now fourth at 16,350′.  The lengthiest gondola in multiple sections remains the Bursa-Uludag three stage system built by Leitner in 2014 at almost 29,000 feet.

Hon Thom Phu Quoc MapThe new record-breaking gondola hopscotches from the large Phu Quoc Island over two smaller ones to an emerald isle called Hon Thom (Pineapple Island), previously undeveloped and encircled by white sand beaches.  $458 million of development is planned for the area which currently is a small fishing community with a state-of-the-art gondola station.

Setting aside its length, the rest of the gondola’s stats are also remarkable.  Hon Thom-Phu Quoc is the world’s fastest gondola, with cabins transiting at 8.5 m/s or 1,673 feet a minute (another Doppelmayr 3S built for the Sochi Olympics can also go 8.5.)  Sun Group’s latest system has more cabins than any other 3S – 70 CWA Taris models for 30 passengers each.  At 3,500 passengers per hour per direction, it would be the fourth highest capacity gondola in North America (Peak 2 Peak, the only 3S in the Americas, moves 2,050 an hour.)   A ride will take only 15.6 minutes at full speed and the lift’s six towers reach up to 525 feet above the Gulf of Thailand.  Four track ropes supplied by Fatzer are a crazy 58.5 mm thick with a 52 mm diameter haul rope.  The haul rope loop is so long that it had to be manufactured in two sections totaling 54,212 feet.  The new gondola will open to the public sometime this spring and we’ll see what Sun Group and Doppelmayr come up with next as they push the boundaries of ropeway technology in Vietnam.

Construction Rises Significantly to 51 Lifts in 2017

Peter Landsman16 Comments

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The Doppelmayr-built Wildcat Express comes together at Snowbasin, one of seven new six-place chairlifts built throughout the western US this year.  More six-packs were added in 2017 than any other year except 2000.

With commissioning wrapping on eleven more lifts than last year at this time, 2017 represents an impressive ten-year high for North American lift building.  Six-passenger chairlifts, T-Bars and urban gondolas in Mexico and the Caribbean drove much of the growth in a year that saw continued changes in the manufacturer landscape.  Compared with 2016, more of this year’s chairlifts were expensive detachable models (12) compared with 17 fixed-grips (in 2016, the split was 7 detachable, 23 fixed.)  A total of nine new gondolas and three T-Bars went up in 2017, both increases from the year before.  Ten additional lifts were relocated and re-purposed, a three-year high with lifts originally built by Blue Mountain, CTEC, Doppelmayr, Riblet, Roebling, Stadeli and Yan finding new homes.  Combined, this year’s new lift class represents a solid 27 percent increase from 2016.

Consistent with last year, about two thirds of the projects in 2017 represented one-for-one replacements in existing alignments.  Interestingly, at least six resorts removed older lifts outright without replacing them.  At many mountains, the era of building and maintaining extra chairlifts that rarely run is over.

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