This weekend is your last chance to ride Snowbird’s oldest chairlift, Chickadee. On Monday, Snowbird will begin work to replace the 1972 Thiokol double with a quad in partnership with Skytrac. The new lift will come out from underneath the Snowbird Center deck, giving beginners more space to queue and load. Riders will also enjoy a loading conveyor, making boarding even easier. “The new and fully grown-up version of the Chickadee chair will continue to create the next generation of powder chasers, future Olympians and local legends, just with a bit more room to squeeze in your whole fam,” said Snowbird.
Interestingly this will be the first lift in Snowbird’s 55 year history not constructed by Doppelmayr or a brand it acquired. Snowbird and Skytrac plan to fast-track construction and christen the new Chickadee for summer operations some time in July.
A fifth chairlift will debut at Nevada’s Lee Canyon next winter servicing five new trails in an area known as West Bowl. The 2,200 foot Skytrac quad will rise 650 vertical feet and transport up to 1,800 skiers per hour. It is shown on the below master plan as Chair 8. Lee Canyon completed a similar expansion to the East three years ago with three new runs. West Bowl trails will range from low intermediate to advanced with snowmaking throughout. West Bowl is expected to open for the 2026/27 winter season.
The expansion caps a period of remarkable growth at Las Vegas’ only ski area with new chairlifts in 2012, 2014 and 2023 plus a new lodge in 2019.
Lee Canyon owner Mountain Capital Partners will also partner with Skytrac this summer on an expansion at Purgatory, Colorado. Skytrac plans a busy year overall with projects in Colorado, Michigan, Nevada, Utah, Wisconsin, British Columbia and Quebec.
Powder Mountain plans to invest $40 million on the public side of the resort over the next two years with a focus on the Sundown zone. Under new majority owner Reed Hastings, Powder operates a public-private model, with lifts on the eastern half of the resort open only to homeowners. So far, Hastings has added five new lifts since 2023 with up to five more on deck.
DMI expansion on the backside of James Peak seen last summer.
Sundown lies within the public western half of the resort with a variety of terrain for both day and night skiing. By fall 2026, Skytrac will complete a new public lift called DMI, serving 1,000 acres of steeps on the backside of Sundown. Construction began last summer on the triple chair, which will rise 1,796 feet and rank among Skytrac’s steepest-ever lifts. On the front side, Leitner-Poma will replace the existing Sundown quad with a detachable. Powder’s fourth high speed quad will expand both capacity and hours. The old Sundown chair will then move to become a beginner chairlift called Doodle. “Doodle allows beginners and ski school students of all ages to get efficient laps on a gentle, dedicated pitch,” said Powder. In addition to three new lifts, the Sundown Lodge will be replaced with a modern 15,000 square foot facility featuring ski school, rentals and dining for 2027-28. “This development plan is a demonstration of our commitment to keeping Powder a thriving public ski resort for generations to come,” said Powder President Brandi Hammon. “As a local and an avid skier, the team and I are committed to our community and season passholders and will continue investing in their on-mountain experience.”
PowMow didn’t announce specifics for the private side known as Powder Haven, though construction began on a new Half Pint chairlift last summer that could also be completed this year. For this project, Powder opted to repurpose equipment from the old Paradise quad for a new high-alpine neighborhood. Powder’s master plan also calls for a new lift up Cobabe Canyon, which could eventually replace the aging Sunrise Poma. For now, Powder Mountain says the Sunrise lift will remain publicly accessible for the 2026/27 season regardless of further lift development on the private side.
Powder Haven Half Pint lift under construction last summer.
In a real estate sales presentation, Red Mountain leaders say expansion lifts on Mt. Kirkup and White Wolf Ridge are a higher priority than replacing existing lifts.
The 13 year-old critically injured in an unloading incident at Ski Vorlage, Quebec last week died four days later, her family says. Quebec’s ropeway regulator inspected the lift post-accident and identified several unspecified corrective actions, now completed.
Five people board a quad chair on the Sourdough Express at Vail, one later jumps off after the lift stops (unclear if they were directed to do so by Vail Resorts staff.)
Castle Mountain, Alberta temporarily closes the new Stagecoach Express to swap a motor.
At Marquette Mountain, Michigan, a misload bends apart a Riblet chair (quickly replaced without incident.)
The Supreme Court strikes down some of President Trump’s import tariffs but not Section 232 steel and aluminum tariffs most affecting lift manufacturers. In response to the decision, the President orders a 10 percent global tariff to last 150 days (USMCA compliant goods and items already subjected to Section 232 tariffs are exempted).
As the world bids farewell to 2025, 49 new lifts are up and running across North America. Forty five of those rose in the United States plus four in Canada. That’s eight fewer installations than 2024 as the Covid-era outdoor travel boom waned slightly. Marquee projects in ’25 included ten passenger gondolas at Big Sky, Deer Valley and Park City – all providing new out-of-base access. Several ski areas pushed boundaries, most notably Deer Valley with six new lifts in the East Village.
Despite a shortage of snow, Loveland Ski Area became the first to open a brand new lift this season at Loveland Valley.
The Rocky Mountain region saw strong investment with 24 lifts opening in Colorado, Montana, New Mexico and Utah. The East also proved strong with 15 new lifts, up by three from 2024. The Pacific states, the Midwest and Canada fared weaker with just a handful of projects each.
Killington debuted its first Doppelmayr lift in history, a six pack servicing the famous Superstar pod.
Both fixed and detachable chairlift construction fell markedly while gondola projects increased to an impressive eight machines. Surface lifts also outperformed with four new platters and T-Bars supplied by three manufacturers. No aerial trams opened this year but that could change soon with projects on the horizon at Cannon Mountain, New Hampshire and Franklin Mountains, Texas.
The Mighty Argo Cable Car under construction in Colorado.
Expansions prevailed with more lifts breaking new ground than any year since 2019. In Alberta, Lake Louise opened Richardson’s Ridge with a Doppelmayr detachable quad and Castle Mountain built the Stagecoach Express serving hundreds of acres of alpine terrain. Stateside, Powder Mountain completed the Davenport addition for homeowners serviced by a Leitner-Poma detachable quad. Monarch Mountain, Colorado will soon debut Tomichi, a Skytrac triple ascending No Name Basin for the first time. In the east, Bryce Resort also partnered with Skytrac to debut a backside expansion with four new trails. Only 30 of 49 new lifts this year directly replaced old lifts, down by nine from last year.
Pinyon Express, one of several new D-Line detachables at Deer Valley Resort this winter.
The only gondola in South Carolina debuted at Riverbanks Zoo & Garden in August.
Doppelmayr and the HTI duo of Leitner-Poma and Skytrac continued to dominate the market in North America. LPOA won slightly more than half of projects (22) with Doppelmayr completing 20 installations. HTI paricularly excelled in the fixed-grip realm with five new Leitner-Poma Alphas and seven Skytrac Monarchs. Doppelmayr dominated the gondola and detachable spaces with six D-Lines and six UNI-Gs. By vertical transport feet per hour (VTFH), Doppelmayr edged out HTI with 46 percent of installed capacity vs. 45 percent. MND Ropeways built its first new lift in three years here, a T-Bar for Waterville Valley, New Hampshire.
The upcoming gondola at Hawks Nest State Park, West Virginia, set to open in spring 2026.
Lifts at places other than ski resorts took off in 2025. The State of West Virginia invested in two fixed grip gondolas at state parks, one of which opened this fall and the other of which will launch come spring. Riverbanks Zoo in South Carolina debuted a gorgeous river crossing gondola in partnership with Leitner-Poma, the first detachable ever built in that state. The Tennessee State Fair debuted a fixed chairlift and OZ Trails Bike Park in Arkansas is putting the finishing touches on a Leitner-Poma high-speed quad, the first detachable in that state.
Park City’s new Sunrise Gondola, a two year project which opened this month.
Nearly 90 percent of lift projects were new-from-manufacturer with just six used lifts re-installed. They represented just under eight percent of new VTFH with Castle Mountain’s high speed quad the largest followed by Alta’s relocation of the Supreme chair. The majority of used lifts were Pomas of various vintages and types.
East Street at Ski Santa Fe, a Poma Alpha reinstallation.
Deer Valley’s new gondola earned largest new lift of the year followed by Big Sky’s Explorer Gondola then Elk Camp Express at Snowmass. Both Doppelmayr and Leitner-Poma engineered lifts across the VTFH spectrum while Skytrac and MND lifts skewed smaller.
Omigosh, a Doppelmayr Alpenstar addition at Cataloochee, North Carolina.
There’s a narrative that only conglomerates can afford new lifts. While lifts have certainly become costlier, this year showed that isn’t the whole story with dozens of independent operators buying really nice machines for their customers to ride. From Wachusett to White Pass and Welch Village, independent ski areas are thriving. Setting aside the Deer Valley megaproject funded by Extell Development Company, Alterra only added one new lift to its existing portfolio at Crystal Mountain, Washington. Same story with Vail Resorts, which built the Sunrise Gondola at Park City in partnership with the Canyons Village Management Association. More than half of all new lifts this year went to what I would consider mom-and-pop, family-owned single mountains.
The industry also retired 53 lifts in 2025, three more than last year, at an average age of 42 years. Eight Halls, six Riblets and four Borvigs went to scrap as resorts modernized fleets. Some 211 Halls, 213 Riblets and 118 Borvigs still spin across the continent, however, with more to be replaced in 2026.
Next year is shaping up to be similar to 2025. Announced new lifts are pacing just slightly behind this time a year ago with 41 installations on my list of likely projects. Several installs initially intended for 2025 were pushed to ’26 including Purgatory’s Gelande triple, Powder Mountain’s DMI and Halfpint lifts, Homewood’s gondola and Bluewood’s summit lift. Several ski areas already announced fresh investments for 2026 including two replacements at Sun Valley, two lifts at Little Switzerland and a new gondola at Sugar Bowl. Independent mountains are poised to continue out-investing conglomerates despite accounting for less than half of skier visits. Vail announced three new lifts for next year and Alterra has several in the pipeline.
As these projects unfold, I hope you’ll continue to read Lift Blog in 2026. 2025 was another record year for the site with 841,000 unique visitors reading nearly 4.7 million pages. Thank you for your support, think snow and Happy New Year.
One of four Canadian projects this year at a Mont-Tremblant real estate developmentcalled L’Hymne des Trembles.
A ranch in Hawaii scales down its proposed gondola in hopes of allaying community concerns. Even so a State Representative plans to introduce a bill to ban chairlifts and gondolas from ever being constructed in Hawaii.
Three more chairlifts are coming to Utah’s Powder Mountain over the next two years, though you’ll need to purchase a house or know someone with one to ride two of them. First, a bit of background. Ever since Powder Mountain’s founding in 1971, the ski area struggled to generate enough cash for growth and capital improvements. The volume of skiers venturing beyond more accessible resorts like Park City and Snowbird was never enough to match the ambition and available terrain at PowMow. Not a single new lift was constructed from 1976 to 1993 while dozens popped up across the Wasatch including an entire new ski area named Deer Valley. Fixed grip doubles and triples serviced the bulk of Powder Mountain’s terrain well into the mid-2000s. A couple different owners tried their hands at PowMow over the following years with only modest growth.
Fast forward to 2023 and Netflix co-founder and chairman Reed Hastings purchased a controlling stake in Powder for $100 million. He quickly pivoted to a bifurcated model where real estate sales and private skiing would subsidize a smaller public mountain. The public side would continue to be known as Powder Mountain with the private complex dubbed Powder Haven. Two existing lifts, Village and Mary’s, were removed from the public area and reserved for homeowners only. Last year, Hastings constructed four new lifts, three of which opened to the public. Raintree became the first all-new lift to be reserved exclusively for real estate owners. The public gained new access to Lightning Ridge. This season Powder will span 8,000 acres, making it the largest mountain in North America (with several caveats.)
Powder broke ground on three more lifts this summer, one of which will be public and two private. I’m told the initial plan was for all three to be completed this summer but permitting delays recently pushed two to next year. The first to open will be Primetime, a Leitner-Poma detachable quad servicing the all-new Davenport territory and topping out next to Raintree. Davenport makes up “1,000 gnarly acres of powdery glades and cut runs on the northeast face of the mountain,” notes Powder Haven’s sales site. “Serviced by a new high-speed detachable lift, Davenport is ready and waiting for those ready to push their limits and let it rip on some of North America’s most uniquely challenging terrain.” Primetime will become the first detachable quad at Powder open exclusively to homeowners and their guests. It will also be the lowest elevation lift at Powder, increasing the mountain’s vertical to 3,346 vertical feet – if you have means to access it.
Powder Haven Half Pint lift line.
Next summer a fixed grip quad will rise to service the private Shelter Hill neighborhood. Its 39 homesites will encompass “a blend of family retreats and bespoke enclaves, each one rare and distinctive in its own way,” the sales deck notes. Skytrac will install the lift, called Half Pint, utilizing CTEC equipment from the former Paradise quad. “Private ski slopes glide down the mountain below,” says the website. “All around, panoramic views and a closeness with the wild world around you.”
By next season Powder Haven will swell to 2,700 private acres, making it larger than most US ski areas with five dedicated chairlifts. A 73,000 square foot lodge is set to open for winter 2027-28, designed by the same architect as the Yellowstone Club, Spanish Peaks and the Ritz-Carlton Bachelor Gulch. The private facility will include a rock climbing wall, thermal pools and omakase experience, among other amenities.
Powder Mountain DMI expansion
The public can look forward to a new DMI lift, scheduled to open for winter 2026-27. This Skytrac triple will service some of the steepest terrain at PowMow, currently accessed only via guided expedition. The lift will rises out of Wolf Canyon and terminate at the top of Sundown. DMI will add 900 acres of lift-served and 147 acres of hike-to access, for a total of 1,047 acres of public advanced terrain. With the addition of DMI, Powder Mountain’s public lift fleet will span two detachable quads, four modern fixed grip chairlifts and several surface lifts. The future of the Sunrise Poma is unclear, woefully under capacity with equipment over 30 years old and a potentially private Cobabe lift earmarked for the same vicinity.
Powder continues to buck industry trends, shunning multi-mountain passes and reserving peak weekends for season passholders again this season. “Escape the Masses,” Powder’s public homepage proclaims. I hit Powder Mountain several times last winter and its was indeed uncrowded and powder-filled, even on weekends. In a letter to passholders last year, Hastings wrote “the previous business model was failing. While we’ve historically been uncrowded and inexpensive, we’ve been losing money, not upgrading lifts or lodges, and building up debt,” he said, simultaneously announcing increased prices but eliminating a cap on the number of season passes sold. “The rise of Epic and Ikon have made the independent ski resort business very challenging, and we likely would have been acquired by one of the mega pass owners had we stayed on the old model…Our Wolf Canyon expansion, alongside limiting day ticket sales and not accepting mega passes, continues to fulfill our promise of keeping Powder Mountain uncrowded, independent, and truly a special experience for generations to come.”
Mont Sutton plans to revitalize its teaching side of the mountain in 2026 with a fixed grip quad from Skytrac. The new lift will replace three aging Mueller doubles and become the first Skytrac in Quebec. The news marks a significant milestone as Doppelmayr dominates the Quebec market and its 75 ski areas (more mountains than any other Canadian province or US state.) Skytrac’s expansion into Canada has been measured thus far with the first Monarch in Canada debuting in 2018 and three projects following at Searchmont, Ontario in 2020, 2021 and 2022. The Leitner-Poma subsidiary has yet to build any lifts in Western Canada.
Sutton’s new lift will load near the main chalet and transport 2,400 skiers per hour. It will feature a loading conveyor and greatly improve the learning experience for beginners and intermediates. As part of the project, Mont Sutton will move an existing conveyor lift, add a second conveyor, implement RFID gates and improve snowmaking around the new chair. The CA$8 million lift project, funded in part by the Government of Quebec, represents the largest investment in the resort’s 65 year history. “This announcement is the culmination of the planning work of all the teams over the past few years,” noted Jean-Michel Ryan, President and CEO of Mont Sutton. “The Skytrac quadruple chairlift, thanks to the quality of the overall proposal made by Poma Canada, meets all the essential criteria sought by Mont Sutton.” Construction is expected to commence in spring 2026 and be complete in time for the 2026-27 ski season.
It’s official: Snowmass will construct two lifts simultaneously this summer for the first time since 2006. Leitner-Poma will replace the Elk Camp detachable quad with a six pack and Skytrac will install a T-Bar to replace the Cirque platter. The projects are part of an $80 million capital improvement summer for Aspen Snowmass. Other projects include a new Ullrhof restaurant, snowmaking upgrades and forest health work. “We have a huge summer ahead for on-mountain developments here at Aspen Snowmass,” said Geoff Buchheister, CEO of Aspen Skiing Company. “These projects represent Aspen One’s commitment to ongoing investment in delivering the most exceptional guest experience possible.”
The Elk Camp chair dates back to 1995, tied for the third oldest lift at Snowmass. Elk Camp services popular intermediate terrain in the winter and hauls bikes to the top of the Snowmass Bike Park come summer. Winter throughput will increase from 2,020 skiers per hour on the current quad to 2,800 while bike haul capacity will nearly double. The lift’s alignment will shift slightly away from the Elk Camp Restaurant.
At the top of the mountain, the curved Cirque platter will be retired in favor of a straight Leitner/Skytrac T-Bar. Capacity here will increase from 450 guests per hour to 1,000. Similar to the new surface lift at Champan Hill, Colorado, Cirque will combine specialized Leitner parts from Europe with American made towers, controls and operator houses from Skytrac.
“The areas of terrain served by these lifts are some of the most popular on our mountain,” said Susan Cross, Mountain Manager at Snowmass. “These updates allow for guests to more smoothly access Snowmass’ classic wide-open slopes and sweeping vistas at Elk Camp, and the incredible variety of high-alpine terrain we have off The Cirque. I am proud that we continue to invest in making this mountain the best that it can be, and having high-speed, higher capacity lifts is critical to the Snowmass experience,” she continued.
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