- Skytrac begins construction on two new quad chairs at a new Rainforest Adventures park in St. Maarten.
- The old Casper triple from Jackson Hole won’t debut at Magic Mountain in time for this winter.
- New York hedge fund buys 13 ski resorts from CNL Lifestyle Properties, Enterainment Properties Trust takes Northstar.
- Saddleback Mountain Foundation agrees to purchase Saddleback for $6 million if it can raise enough money.
- Seattle real estate developer buys Silver Mountain.
- Steamboat’s local paper previews the Elkhead Express.
- First cabins fly on the Dominican Republic’s new urban gondola system.
- Doppelmayr’s latest Wir magazine is available.
- Some splice advice from Mountain Wire Rope Services.
- The Black Hawk finds new civilian life with Timberline Helicopters building lifts.
- Powder Mountain makes new lifts official, will become largest ski resort in the United States.
Silver Mountain
News Roundup: Vacation
Hello readers- for the next two weeks I am floating the Grand Canyon without access to the internet. I’ve scheduled a few posts for my absence, otherwise lift blogging will resume Nov. 5th –Peter from Flagstaff, Arizona.
- Ski season launches tomorrow at A-Basin. COO Al Henceroth is also looking for one of the resort’s original single chairs.
- Silver Mountain reportedly sells for a fire-sale price of $5 million. The resort’s gondola, formerly the world’s longest, cost $8 million in 1990.
- Doppelmayr goes to Moscow, Poma goes to Barcelona and Orlando.
- Wire Austin gets a website.
- Take a ride on the newly-named Hexago six-pack at Le Relais.
- In case you missed it, Gregg Blanchard of SlopeFillers fame interviewed me about Lift Blog.
- Woman sues Aspen Skiing Company over loading incident at the Snowmass Village Express.
- Vail Resorts to debut $100 million in capital improvements for 2016-17 including four new lifts. With Whistler-Blackcomb now Epic, the company will likely invest even more in 2017.
- 9News profiles the CPTSB.
The Ten Longest Lift Rides in North America
The average lift ride in the United States and Canada takes just under five minutes. In fact, only about four percent of lifts (fewer than a hundred) take more than ten minutes to ride. You wouldn’t know it hearing the average skier complaining about long and slow lifts at just about any ski area. Below are the ten longest lifts by actual ride time at design speed. Of course lifts do not always run at their design speed but this gives a pretty good idea of the longest rides. Two of the top ten are detachable lifts that are so long that they take more than 15 minutes.
1. Burfield Quad – Sun Peaks Resort, BC – 1997 Doppelmayr Fixed-grip quad
9,510 feet at 453 fpm = 21 minutes
2. Cyclone – Sunrise Park Resort, AZ – 1983 Yan Fixed-grip triple
7,982 feet at 450 fpm = 17.7 minutes
3. Gondola – Silver Mountain, ID – 1990 VonRoll 8-passenger gondola
16,350 feet at 1,000 fpm = 16.4 minutes
4. Castlerock – Sugarbush Resort, VT – 2001 Poma fixed-grip double
4,707 feet at 300 fpm = 15.7 minutes
5. Wallowa Lake Tramway, OR – 1968 Hall 4-passenger gondola
9.650 feet at 650 fpm = 14.9 minutes
North America’s Top Ten Longest Lifts
North America’s top ten longest lifts are all gondolas or aerial tramways and only half of them are directly used for skiing. Silver Mountain’s Gondola is number one although it is no longer the world’s longest. Since 2014, that title has belonged to the Bursa Uludag Gondola in Turkey which is a ridiculous 28,871 feet. This list does not include systems which have multiple haul ropes, such as Blackcomb’s Excalibur, which I consider to be two separate gondolas.
1. Silver Mountain Gondola, Silver Mountain, Idaho – 1990 VonRoll 8-passenger gondola
16,350′ ride time 16.4 minutes
2. Sunshine Village Gondola, Sunshine Village, Alberta – 2001 Poma 8-passenger gondola
14,894′ ride time 12.4 minutes
3. Peak 2 Peak Gondola, Whistler-Blackcomb, British Columbia – 2008 Doppelmayr 3S tri-cable gondola
14,497′ ride time 9.8 minutes
4. Sandia Peak Tramway, Albuquerque, New Mexico – 1965 Bell 50-passenger tramway
14,338′
5. Silver Queen Gondola, Aspen Mountain, Colorado – 1986 Poma 6-passenger gondola
13,216′ ride time 13.2 minutes
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