- Vail Resorts reports skier visits down 3.1%, lift revenue up 3.4%, ski school revenue up 2.7%, dining up 2.2% and retail/rental down 4.0% with pass sales for next year down slightly in units.
- Burke Mountain to be sold to Bear Den Partners for $11.5 million.
- Park City explores possible routes for a Main Street-Deer Valley gondola.
- Ski Utah continues advocating for a Little Cottonwood gondola.
- Telluride seeks approval for yet-to-be-specified projects from its master plan.
- Boyne launches two multi-resort pass products good at all their resorts.
- Local artists to transform Park City Sunrise chairs into works of art to be auctioned for charity.
- Italy opens a criminal investigation into last week’s fatal tram incident involving a haul rope failure and track rope brake failure on one of two cabins.
- Steeplechase, Minnesota turns to crowdfunding to finance expansion.
- Leitner-Poma Canada is hiring lift installers for a project at Whitewater, BC.
- Loveland to operate the new Lift 7 quad as a triple.
- Killington is full steam ahead on Superstar replacement.
- Red Lodge Mountain begins repairing the chairlift involved in a fatal incident last month.
- Palisades Tahoe invites local high school students on mountain operations tours to aid with recruitment.
Killington
News Roundup: Windstorm
- Killington’s Superstar lift replacement will cancel the 2025 Killington World Cup; chairs from Superstar will move to Golden Express at Pico.
- An unseated passenger is successfully caught in a deceleration net at Killington.
- Powderhorn plans a detachable replacement for West End.
- Gunstock loses its summit chairlift for much of the holiday week due to gearbox failure.
- Silver Mountain, Idaho rope evacuates Chair 4 due to a power outage and evacuation engine failure (now back open).
- A falling tree in high wind causes a three tower deropement on the Belleaye Express at Belleayre, New York (scheduled to reopen some time tomorrow).
- The same storm leads to a deropement and rope evacuation at Pats Peak, New Hampshire (back open).
- And the roof blows off Stratton’s gondola top terminal (also back open).
- Following three recent incidents in the state, New Hampshire clarifies how its tramway oversight works.
- Brattleboro Ski Hill in Vermont closes due to an electric motor issue.
- Arkansas adopts the ANSI standard in advance of its first chairlift installation.
- Pioneer at Park City still hasn’t run this season but may soon.
- Cannon’s tramway is still on track for $19 million in upgrades.
- Sugarloaf confirms plans to install Big Sky’s former Six Shooter to replace Timberline, a two year project.
- Stevens Pass rope evacuates the new Kehr’s quad at night.
- Echo Mountain, Colorado also has a night rope evac.
- Timberline closes the Molly’s detachable quad due to damage to a tower from a snow cat.
- Tenney Mountain, New Hampshire loses its main lift due to a mechanical issue.
- Hersheypark, Pennsylvania retires its chairlift ride.
News Roundup: Shortest and Longest
- Vista Ridge, Alberta rope evacuates the Wilson quad.
- Lutsen rope evacuates the Caribou Express (*despite what the link says, customers did receive lift ticket vouchers)
- Summit Express at Keystone has been down since last Saturday.
- Both Snowcat and Bobcat are inoperable at Wildcat, New Hampshire.
- The problem with Blackcomb’s Glacier Express is gearbox-related; WB airlifts a new electric motor into the Big Red Express terminal by helicopter with minimal down time.
- A number of lifts are also inoperable at Seven Springs, PA.
- A minor holder of Vail stock calls for executive firings and publishes a detailed presentation why.
- A teenager is injured and airlifted after hitting a lift tower at Mohawk Mountain.
- Killington has looked at replacing Ramshead with a bubble lift.
- Burke Mountain removes its J-Bar from the snow report entirely.
- Sitzmark, Washington won’t open this season.
- The Forest Service green lights Brighton to replace Milly Express and shorten Explorer.
- Looming tariffs on both Canada and the European Union could impact both lift manufacturers and their customers.
- The world’s shortest T-Bar – with no towers and just five carriers – begins spinning tomorrow.
- The world’s longest gondola reaches 60 percent completion with 290 workers on site.
News Roundup: Strike Over
- Park City’s patrol strike ends after 12 days; Vail apologizes to guests and a class action lawsuit is filed.
- Spirit Mountain, Minnesota solicits bids to replace Gandy with a quad this summer.
- Bald Mountain, Idaho may not open this season due to inability to secure insurance.
- Leitner-Poma President Daren Cole joins Banff Sunshine’s podcast to discuss the Super Angel Express and lift business more broadly.
- A sit skier who fell from Winter Park’s Explorer Express and was seriously injured files suit.
- Pursuit completes its acquisition of the Jasper SkyTram.
- Saskadena Six, Vermont will not operate Chair Two this season, looks at a replacement.
- Eaglecrest, Alaska continues to look toward a sightseeing gondola to subsidize its money-losing ski operation.
- Killington’s Superstar six pack will cost $12.16 million,
- Mt. Bachelor plans several enhancements to the Northwest Express.
- Sugarbush to bring in additional staff from across Alterra to try and get non-functional lifts open.
- Four Seasons, New York is listed for sale.
- Sandia Peak proposes replacing Chair 1.
News Roundup: Battery Powered
- West Virginia State Parks delays opening of the new Pipestem gondola to spring 2025.
- A tower crane working to build the Grands Montets 3S in Chamonix collapses due to wind and ice.
- Keystone installs solar panels on the Bergman Express to power ancillary functions such as lights.
- Perfect North transforms the Red Chair into an LED light show for the holidays with individual chairs lit by batteries.
- ORDA plans to build not one but two people mover chairlifts at Mt. Van Hoevenberg.
- Hunter names its new quad chair Otis.
- Planning documents show the alignment and D-Line equipment for a planned gondola at Stagecoach, Colorado.
- More ink on the unfortunate closure of Homewood this season.
- The world’s shortest T-Bar to be built with only 5 Ts.
- A criminal trial begins regarding the deadly gondola collapse in Turkey last spring.
- Garaventa installs a robotic cargo loading system on the world’s steepest aerial tramway.
- Kendall Mountain, Colorado suspends pass sales due to lift maintenance.
- Killington’s CEO talks about future lifts beyond Superstar; how the sale to locals went down.
- Park City weighs possible routes for a transit gondola from Old Town to Deer Valley.
- Mt. Waterman, California sells to a new owner promising private powder days.
- Powder Mountain won’t sell any lift tickets on weekends in February.
- Sun Peaks’ new trail map shows the West Bowl expansion.
- Indy Pass to announce new resorts next week.
News Roundup: No Boundaries
- Homewood will miss the 2024-25 ski season.
- Closed Big Tupper, New York to be auctioned November 7th.
- A ranch owner in Nevada’s Ruby Mountains explores building the region’s first ski resort.
- Black Mountain, New Hampshire is sold to Indy Pass, may become a community co-op.
- San Francisco to assess an urban gondola route between a light rail station and hospital.
- Bloomberg explores broad community benefits from Mexico City’s growing gondola network.
- The No Boundaries Pass won’t return this year, citing Indy Pass exclusivity policies.
- Killington’s new owners share details about the future.
Killington to Replace Superstar Express and Upgrade Skyeship Gondola
The sale of Killington and Pico to local investors has closed and today the group announced their initial tranche of capital investments. Over the next 12 to 16 months, Killington plans to spend roughly $30 million to build a Superstar Express six pack, add 1,000 HKD low energy new snow guns and replace all 116 Skyeship Gondola cabins. Skyeship’s cabin storage facility will also be replaced in the near future. The current Superstar lift is the oldest detachable chairlift in New England, dating back to 1987 (tied with two other lifts at Killington/Pico and the Grand Summit Express at Mount Snow.)
The news comes just over a month since Powdr announced the sale of Killington and listing of three other resorts. “Over the next 10 years, our goal is to reinvest all the profits the mountain creates,” said Michael Ferri, one of two lead investors in Killington Independence Group, LLC, comprised of 16 total investors. “[Profits] will stay here in Vermont, they will stay here at Pico and they will stay here at Killington,” said Ferri.
Surprisingly after 37 straight lifts from other manufacturers, Killington selected Doppelmayr to construct the new Superstar Six. Unlike Killington’s Snowdon Six, the new lift will not feature bubbles. “There are a number of factors, but this lift is a relatively short ride which makes having bubbles on the lift less impactful, especially considering the added complexity of needing a storage barn for overnight storage of bubble chairs,” said Killington. Superstar has one of the longest winter operating schedules in the country, spinning for World Cup ski racing in November all the way until the end of the season in May or June. “The Superstar lift replacement will affect spring skiing this season and potentially the 2025 Stifel Killington Cup, noted Killington President and CEO Mike Solimano. “We do plan to make more snow in North Ridge to extend the season in the Canyon this year and are working with the lift manufacturer to finalize the construction plan for the lift before making the call on the Killington Cup,” he continued.
Leitner-Poma will supply new cabins for Skyeship, the same Diamond model the K-1 Gondola received in 2018. “Many of our current operational challenges with [Skyeship] can be attributed to the older cabins,” noted Killington. “The challenges are exasperated by not being able to store the cabins in a heated building causing door opening and closing mechanisms to become frozen overnight.” All of these improvements are slated for the next two years with more expected to follow over the next decade.
News Roundup: Ikon Addition
- Sierra-at-Tahoe joins the Ikon Pass, Taos returns to the Ikon Base Pass.
- Owners of Mt. Norquay, Lake Louise and Sunshine Village express dismay at an American company’s proposed purchase of the Jasper SkyTram.
- Elk Mountain, Pennsylvania is for sale.
- A local group considers bidding for Mt. Bachelor.
- Copper thieves damage the only lift at Blizzard Mountain, Idaho.
- Killington’s future owners promise a massive capital improvement push and numerous lift upgrades, reveal Powdr considered closing the Skyeship Gondola.
- The government of Newfoundland and Labrador tries again to sell money losing Marble Mountain.
- The proposed Shadow Mountain Bike Park in Colorado would include a detachable six pack.
- Mountain Capital Partners seeks a Director of Lifts to oversee maintenance, new installations, used lift sourcing and more.
- Steamboat removes Priest Creek‘s old towers and repairs damage on the Christie Peak Express.
- Aspen Mountain to remove Gent’s Ridge this fall.
- Gent’s Ridge and Jackson Hole’s old Sublette parts will head to Maverick Mountain, Montana.
Local Investors Purchase Killington and Pico from Powdr
New England’s largest ski resort has been sold to a local group of investors for an undisclosed price. The sale, which had been rumored for weeks, is the second recent disposition by Powdr following the sale of Lee Canyon, Nevada to Mountain Capital Partners in 2023. Lead investors in the new ownership group, Phill Gross and Michael Ferri, both have long term ties to the Killington area and ski racing. Gross is Managing Director of Boston-based Adage Capital Management and Ferri owns Valvoline Instant Oil Change franchises throughout the East Coast. Powdr will retain a minority stake and one seat on Killington/Pico’s board of directors. Current management will remain in place and the resorts will continue to participate in the Ikon Pass. “The Killington leadership team is excited about this opportunity to build on the strong foundation laid by Powdr,” said Mike Solimano, President and General Manager of Killington Resort. “We believe that local ownership will allow us to be even more responsive to the needs and desires of our community and guests.”
The sale is expected to close this fall. In an email to employees, Powdr said it also plans to list Eldora, Colorado; Mt. Bachelor, Oregon and SilverStar, British Columbia for sale in the coming weeks. The Park City-based company expects to retain Boreal, California; Copper Mountain, Colorado; Snowbird, Utah; Soda Springs, California and Woodward Park City, Utah as its only five alpine ski areas. The company has been expanding its portfolio of Woodward action sports parks of late and bidding on concession contracts with the National Park Service in order to diversify its portfolio.
During the Powdr era, Killington made significant upgrades to its infrastructure including a new K-1 lodge, Snowdon bubble six pack, North Ridge quad and new cabins on the K-1 gondola. The Beast faces significant ongoing capital needs, however, including a replacement for the Superstar Express and a higher capacity lift on Ramshead Mountain. “We are grateful to Powdr for their stewardship over the years, as Killington saw substantial improvements to infrastructure, snowmaking capabilities, and year-round growth,” said Gross and Ferri. “For our families, Killington is more than just a business or asset to own; it is our home. We are thrilled to guide the mountain into a substantial investment phase. Mike and his leadership team have done a great job, and we look forward to giving them the resources to up our game and continue to evolve Killington as a leader among world-class resorts with strong local roots.”
News Roundup: Trams
- New Hampshire seeks $15 million more on top of $18 million already appropriated for Cannon Mountain tram upgrades.
- Cannon Mountain’s new General Manager says the publicly-owned ski area has a critical need for infrastructure updates beyond the tram.
- America’s next all-new aerial tramway will likely be built in Texas.
- Killington’s large new village development includes a real estate access chairlift.
- Pats Peak looks to replace the Hurricane triple.
- Mont Sutton plans to replace three aging chairlifts with one carpet load quad partially financed by the Province of Quebec.
- Le Relais, Quebec sells to new, local owners.
- Mt. Waterman goes on the market.
- Bogus Basin to auction chairs from two decommissioned lifts.
- Ober Mountain has chairs for sale for $200.
- White Pass proposes replacing Chair 4 with a fixed grip quad.
