Bottom terminal building.Loading area.Crossing under the Needles Gondola.Riding up.Upper section of the lift.Arriving up top.Unload ramp.Upper lift line.Middle part of the line.
When I load the chair there are cables which are part of the counterweight that go inside where the door is saying “Authorized personal only”.
Also at the top you can hear the engine running in the background.
Does anyone know why the climbout sheave trains are on the ground? I was on needles gondola and I was scratching my head why its it got dismantled? New sheave train?
A few years back when I talked to Cole Steadman the lift supervisor there, (Has since moved on) they were quite pleased with how well Becker and Porky had held up over the years. Stadeli’s lifts were heavy duty and quite solid.
Does anybody know why Stadeli never installed any detachables in the U.S.? Their 80s HSQs seem like they are better than what dopp/poma were offering at the time.
Stadeli never really made it in the US. They did fine in mid 60s, but by the time the 80s came around, Stadeli only installed lifts at Waterville NH and later Becker and Porky in 1986.
While on length this is a lift I’d consider for a high speed quad, I think Middle Bowl more urgently needs a detachable and Porcupine could make do with adding a loading carpet.
Well you were right about Middle Bowl! We are still waiting for Porky to open this season, but Becker just opened up today. I hope to get up there to see and try the loading carpet on Becker before they eventually replace her.
I think the big question at hand is, which of the two remaining triples will be the next to get upgraded to a detachable? Both are the same length and age, though serve entirely different types of terrain (Porcupine being all blues and blacks while Becker has one green on it) and likely have different traffic levels.
I would think becker, but I think snowbasin needs to build there strawberry quad first because the strawberry gondola can become quite the bottleneck on the weekends
Snowbasin’s filing plans to replace Becker, though I imagine that won’t be until the 2025-2026 season at the earliest. I think they’ll be going with a six pack for Becker. Porky could probably eke by with a high speed quad when it gets replaced, though I could see a six pack here too for wind resistance reasons (six pack chairs being heavier than quad chairs).
Utah Lost Ski Area ProjectJanuary 24, 2022 / 10:06 am
Porky lift is almost never congested unless Strawberry, Needles and JP are closed for wind, which is a pretty rare occurrence. With the new Middle Bowl shifting skier traffic toward Needles, Porky hasn’t seen the usage it used to have prior to Middle Bowl’s replacement.
And the addition of DeMoisy this season has undoubtedly even further shifted traffic away from Porcupine, since intermediates who were deterred from going to Strawberry Basin by needing to remove their gear after each run now have a chairlift to lap the terrain.
I skiied there today and I see the main issue with Porkupine is that it kinda is not super convenient to lap compared to the other lifts, not specifically because its long but because it does not serve its own terrain pod. It sort of just serves a couple small blue runs up top that all just converge on the crowded run under the Needles gondola. Honestly I think if they did do anything a new lift should follow a different allignment.
While skiing here today I noticed something about this lift. I think major improvement here would be to shorten it to start around tower 9 and 8. This would really help make the runs it serves more lappable and reduce congestion on that section of blue grouse. It might make it more difficult to get to from wildcat but would make it serve more of its own terrain pod. They could simply replace the return with a new one from skytrac and give it a loading carpet like becker.
This is opinion only, from 2 winters working here at this Place That Shall Not Be Named: Porky is great as is. It is calm at a place that can be crazy. It is inconvenient, a little weird, slow, all things that big corporations work to excise from the liability sheets. I feel that, coupled with Staedli’s demise and the simple fact that folks forget it exists, it should be kept in its current state. Locals who know and tourists who stumble upon it get to enjoy. That quiet amphitheatre up top is priceless, as is the the long ride. Old Middle Bowl is gone, as is Old Wildcat, and Porky is the last vestige. It is worth preserving. Weber County is better than SLC County and Summit County, specifically because it is weird and backward and not up to code. I vote more of the same. I know I will be outvoted.
I didnt mean replacement I just meant it can be even more of a calm special area if it was shortened to avoid that traffic jam right before the current starting position.
I always enjoyed spending my mornings over off of Becker and then work up to Middle Bowl when the lines at Becker and Wildcat got too long, and then spend the last 2 hours of the day off of Porky. Grant it I was just a kid back then and Becker and Porky still smelled new but it was a great area even back then. I sure do miss it.
With Becker being upgraded to a six pack this year, this’ll be the last fixed grip lift left on the hill. And even then, I imagine it’ll only have a few years before Snowbasin considers making Porky detachable too.
Becker might have been on the list back in March 2024 when Donald made the comment, but Becker is now on the Liftblog 2025 list for confirmed replacements.
Lift Blog 
I think you got the tensioning and drive switched around. If you look at this video I recently made https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X9iYYT06Mek
When I load the chair there are cables which are part of the counterweight that go inside where the door is saying “Authorized personal only”.
Also at the top you can hear the engine running in the background.
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Does anyone know why the climbout sheave trains are on the ground? I was on needles gondola and I was scratching my head why its it got dismantled? New sheave train?
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Routine summer maintenance?
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Porky, Beckie, and MB are getting some heavy maintenance this year.
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Yeah I was riding the gondola and the climbout sheaves on porcupine got replaced and the com line is very saggy atm.
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A few years back when I talked to Cole Steadman the lift supervisor there, (Has since moved on) they were quite pleased with how well Becker and Porky had held up over the years. Stadeli’s lifts were heavy duty and quite solid.
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Does anybody know why Stadeli never installed any detachables in the U.S.? Their 80s HSQs seem like they are better than what dopp/poma were offering at the time.
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No one ever ordered any from them I suppose.. That or they were not willing to build these over here? I don’t know…
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Stadeli never really made it in the US. They did fine in mid 60s, but by the time the 80s came around, Stadeli only installed lifts at Waterville NH and later Becker and Porky in 1986.
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Taos got a few of them in the 80s as well. They also had one up in Idaho at Sun Valley in 72. I don’t think any made it to California, OR, or WA?
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While on length this is a lift I’d consider for a high speed quad, I think Middle Bowl more urgently needs a detachable and Porcupine could make do with adding a loading carpet.
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Well you were right about Middle Bowl! We are still waiting for Porky to open this season, but Becker just opened up today. I hope to get up there to see and try the loading carpet on Becker before they eventually replace her.
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I think the big question at hand is, which of the two remaining triples will be the next to get upgraded to a detachable? Both are the same length and age, though serve entirely different types of terrain (Porcupine being all blues and blacks while Becker has one green on it) and likely have different traffic levels.
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I would think becker, but I think snowbasin needs to build there strawberry quad first because the strawberry gondola can become quite the bottleneck on the weekends
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Snowbasin’s filing plans to replace Becker, though I imagine that won’t be until the 2025-2026 season at the earliest. I think they’ll be going with a six pack for Becker. Porky could probably eke by with a high speed quad when it gets replaced, though I could see a six pack here too for wind resistance reasons (six pack chairs being heavier than quad chairs).
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kinda crazy Snowbaisn did exactly what you guys talked about, except with demoisy being a 6 instead of 4.
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I’m thinking they’ll cut a deal and replace both at the same time. I haven’t been up in awhile.. how congested does Porky get now a days?
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Porky lift is almost never congested unless Strawberry, Needles and JP are closed for wind, which is a pretty rare occurrence. With the new Middle Bowl shifting skier traffic toward Needles, Porky hasn’t seen the usage it used to have prior to Middle Bowl’s replacement.
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And the addition of DeMoisy this season has undoubtedly even further shifted traffic away from Porcupine, since intermediates who were deterred from going to Strawberry Basin by needing to remove their gear after each run now have a chairlift to lap the terrain.
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I skiied there today and I see the main issue with Porkupine is that it kinda is not super convenient to lap compared to the other lifts, not specifically because its long but because it does not serve its own terrain pod. It sort of just serves a couple small blue runs up top that all just converge on the crowded run under the Needles gondola. Honestly I think if they did do anything a new lift should follow a different allignment.
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While skiing here today I noticed something about this lift. I think major improvement here would be to shorten it to start around tower 9 and 8. This would really help make the runs it serves more lappable and reduce congestion on that section of blue grouse. It might make it more difficult to get to from wildcat but would make it serve more of its own terrain pod. They could simply replace the return with a new one from skytrac and give it a loading carpet like becker.
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This is opinion only, from 2 winters working here at this Place That Shall Not Be Named: Porky is great as is. It is calm at a place that can be crazy. It is inconvenient, a little weird, slow, all things that big corporations work to excise from the liability sheets. I feel that, coupled with Staedli’s demise and the simple fact that folks forget it exists, it should be kept in its current state. Locals who know and tourists who stumble upon it get to enjoy. That quiet amphitheatre up top is priceless, as is the the long ride. Old Middle Bowl is gone, as is Old Wildcat, and Porky is the last vestige. It is worth preserving. Weber County is better than SLC County and Summit County, specifically because it is weird and backward and not up to code. I vote more of the same. I know I will be outvoted.
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I didnt mean replacement I just meant it can be even more of a calm special area if it was shortened to avoid that traffic jam right before the current starting position.
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I’d say start it in between tower 14/15 that would make it a perfect length and would make the terrain more lappable.
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I thought about that too but I think it would bypass a lot of porky face and the bowl
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I always enjoyed spending my mornings over off of Becker and then work up to Middle Bowl when the lines at Becker and Wildcat got too long, and then spend the last 2 hours of the day off of Porky. Grant it I was just a kid back then and Becker and Porky still smelled new but it was a great area even back then. I sure do miss it.
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With Becker being upgraded to a six pack this year, this’ll be the last fixed grip lift left on the hill. And even then, I imagine it’ll only have a few years before Snowbasin considers making Porky detachable too.
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I didn’t know becker was going to be upgraded, where did you hear about this?
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Becker might have been on the list back in March 2024 when Donald made the comment, but Becker is now on the Liftblog 2025 list for confirmed replacements.
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Now Becker I’d officially on the list as a high speed quad.
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