- It’s official: Sun Peaks retires the West Bowl T-Bar with planning underway for future lift access.
- A chondola is proposed to replace Dreamcatcher at Grand Targhee Resort.
- Mount Snow’s 2022 detachables will cost a combined $11.8 million and be constructed by Doppelmayr.
- Walt Disney World reveals it studied nine different layouts with up to four different lines before it built the Disney Skyliner.
- Bousquet debuts an all-new trail map. Nordic Valley too.
- Doppelmayr faces supply chain delays at Sundance; another resort will loan used chairs for the Outlaw Express until new ones arrive in January.
- Catamount also cites supply chain delays and expects to open its two used chairlifts around Christmas and Martin Luther King weekends, respectively.
- Crotched Mountain renames Park lift to Rover.
- Belleayre changes Tomahawk to Lift 8.
- Utah’s Eagle Point eyes building a 5,500 foot connector lift.
- Sunrise Park will reopen its summit lodge this season and plans to reactivate the Cyclone triple next winter.
- Whistler Blackcomb’s replacement of the Creekside Gondola is now a 10 place rather than the originally announced eight.
Sun Peaks
News Roundup: Forecasting Demand
- Washington’s Mission Ridge buys Blacktail Mountain, Montana.
- Bousquet intends to replace the Blue chair with a quad in the next two to three years.
- A gondola is proposed to cross between Kansas and Missouri.
- Bromont adds loading conveyors to two fixed quads; Sun Peaks upgrades Crystal with one too.
- Rusty Gregory says Ikon Pass sales are growing at a faster rate than any previous selling season.
- Vail Resorts will limit ticket sales during holidays, introduce lift line wait time forecasts and devote extra staff to managing lift mazes.
- Catamount touts more than $15 million offseason upgrades including two new chairlifts.
- Whitefish Mountain Resort posts updated trail maps showing Chair 8’s new alignment.
- Next year’s new lift at Whitefish will be called the Snow Ghost Express.
- Justin Sibley becomes CEO of Powdr.
- Jackson Hole’s five year roadmap includes detachable replacements for Thunder and Sublette plus a potential a Lower Faces lift.
- Gallix, the Quebec ski area where lift was damaged by flooding, says repairs will cost over CA$2 million. The bottom station of the chairlift has been disassembled and a new rope ordered.
- Poma and the Government of Brazil reach an agreement to reactivate Rio’s longest urban gondola after 5 years.
- The Telluride Daily Planet explains the gondola evacuation process for one of the more complex systems in the country.
- Manning Park says the atmospheric river which caused flooding across southern British Columbia damaged its alpine ski area.
- Big Sky’s Swift Current will open Thursday with Swifty 6 packs of local beer to celebrate.
- Aspen Mountain is finally approved to add a lift in Pandora’s.
- Connecticut’s Woodbury Ski Area is sold with the new owner intending to reopen it.
News Roundup: Retirements
- Snow Ridge, NY retires its Snowy Meadows double in favor of a conveyor.
- Ditto for the J-Bar at Suicide Six, Vermont.
- The San Francisco Chronicle checks in on Sierra at Tahoe‘s recovery.
- An electrician is hospitalized following a possible lightning strike at Cypress Mountain.
- An anti-gondola candidate is elected mayor of the town where a Little Cottonwood Gondola would begin.
- A local author tells the story of how a hodgepodge of used chairlifts set the stage for Big Sky’s cutting edge lifts.
- The Italian tram car involved in last May’s deadly incident is removed from the mountain by helicopter.
- The Breckenridge Town Council approves a plan for the Breckenridge Grand Vacations gondola and stipulates its developer must choose a detachable model.
- Sun Peaks Resort won’t operate the West Bowl T-Bar for the second year in a row.
- Reopening Hickory, NY intends to operate all three lifts this season when snow permits.
- The Prairie Sky Gondola is officially under development in Edmonton.
- Shawnee Mountain’s next new lift will likely be a fixed quad replacing the double–double.
- Prague looks to build an urban 3S gondola with three stations.
- Discussions continue regarding the future of the aging Telluride-Mountain Village gondola system.
- Palisades Tahoe confirms the new base-to-base gondola won’t open this winter.
- Aspen Snowmass ups its minimum wage to $17 for hourly employees and $50,000 for salaried workers.
- Brundage says new lifts and terrain are coming, though specifics are pending.
- Loon Mountain gets ready to welcome guests aboard the new Kanc 8.
News Roundup: Naming
- Jackson Hole’s Tram Maintenance Manager explains why Big Red is closed this summer.
- Wildcat Mountain says scenic chairlift rides will resume on 7/31 following a lift upgrade project.
- A Salt Lake TV station devotes a half hour to exploring the gondola and bus options for Little Cottonwood Canyon.
- UDOT extends the public comment period for the LCC project to 70 days, ending September 3rd.
- The renaming of Squaw Valley Alpine Meadows is pushed back to early Fall.
- Okemo reports great progress on two new lifts.
- The Forest Service says at least two of Grand Targhee’s proposed expansion lifts will not be approved and a decision on others won’t come until late 2022.
- The new high speed quad on Peak 7 at Breckenridge will be called Freedom SuperChair.
- Four more mountains will join the Indy Pass next week.
- New Hampshire reports solid pandemic skier visits similar to pre-pandemic numbers.
- Local politicians oppose a direct route for the Burnaby Mountain Gondola.
- Pittsburgh considers an urban gondola to connect two downtown districts.
- Both Doppelmayr Canada and Leitner-Poma offer to finance the Cascade Skyline Gondola.
- Sun Peaks shutters mountain operations due to regional wildfires.
- Progress report from Leitner-Poma and Skytrac’s big project at Snow King Mountain:
News Roundup: Name Game
- Ski areas across New Mexico are ordered to close for the rest of the month.
- Saddleback GM Andy Shepard joins the Storm Skiing Podcast to discuss reopening, possible 2021 lift additions and more.
- Mission Ridge aims to open Washington’s first bubble chair by the Christmas holiday.
- Big Tupper is likely to be foreclosed on this spring and a group wants the town to buy it.
- Snow Ridge, NY and Antelope Butte, WY join the Indy Pass, bring it to 59 mountains.
- The proposed community ski hill in Valemount, BC looks to buy a T-Bar.
- Could the pandemic finally bring order to chaotic lift mazes in the Swiss Alps?
- The Hermitage Club relaunches as a member-owned ski area.
- Sun Peaks’ new map shows the route of the new Crystal chair.
- Take a video visit to one of America’s largest lost ski areas.
- The City of Burbank opposes a gondola in Griffith Park near Los Angeles.
- Vail Resorts will report earnings on December 10th, traditionally when the company announces capital improvements for the following year.
- Belleayre renames the Superchief lift Belleayre Express and Whiteface christens its new lift Falcon.
- New Bousquet owners intend to upgrade or replace the Blue chair in the coming years.
- The State of Utah officially adds the La Caille gondola base option to the Little Cottonwood transportation study.
News Roundup: Construction, Construction, Construction
- Sun Peaks’ seventh quad chair is complete.
- Lake Louise previews Canada’s only expansion for 2020.
- Camelback announces the new Sunbowl Quad will extend higher than the lifts it replaces.
- Mission Ridge forges its own path erecting a used high speed quad in house with local contractors.
- Alterra’s Rusty Gregory talks about winter demand.
- Cannon Mountain’s tramway will likely start the season on indefinite hold due to public health concerns.
- Australian regulators conclude hand carrying bikes on chairlifts is not safe.
- After six months closed, the Palm Springs Tramway reopens at less than 25 percent capacity.
- Soldier Mountain reveals comm lines, chairs and haul ropes were all damaged in this summer’s fire.
- Another new resort will join the Indy Pass, to be announced Monday.
News Roundup: Name Change
- MND introduces a new brand with four divisions: MND Snow, MND Safety, MND Leisure and MND Ropeways (formerly LST.)
- MND expects a return to profitability next year and projects the global ropeway market will reach $4.3 billion in 2024.
- Construction gets underway on the third MND T-Bar in the United States.
- Wolf Creek leaves Colorado Ski Country USA.
- North America’s longest gondola misses Labor Day weekend due to a mechanical issue.
- Sun Peaks won’t spin the West Bowl T-Bar this winter.
- Jackson Hole will increase lift speeds and allow skiers to bypass the Aerial Tram by hiking to the summit this winter.
- China Peak reports minimal on-mountain damage from the Creek Fire so far.
- Killington will open later than normal with 50 percent lift capacity.
- Here’s the latest Timberline Mountain construction update.
Sun Peaks Confirms Crystal Quad for 2020
Two years after partnering to build the new Orient Quad, Sun Peaks Resort and Doppelmayr will again team up to replace the Crystal triple on the upper mountain. The lift will be realigned, unloading at the Top of the World adjacent to the Burfield Quad. Dating back to 1979, Crystal was the very first Doppelmayr chairlift built at what was then called Tod Mountain. The new fixed grip quad will be Sun Peaks’ 13th Doppelmayr installation spanning five decades. “A new Crystal Chair is very important as we look at the future of our upper mountain terrain at Sun Peaks,” said Darcy Alexander, Sun Peaks Vice President and General Manager in a press release. “As more people continue to discover the Sun Peaks experience, we need to invest in moving additional guests around the mountain effectively and efficiently.” Work on the $3.8 million project will begin immediately with completion in advance of the 2020-21 ski season.
Sun Peaks also announced the Burfield quad will not be shortened as envisioned in the resort’s master plan. The 9,500-plus foot lift will continue to offer nearly 3,000 vertical feet of skiing from the Top of the World alongside Crystal.
Sun Peaks is owned and operated by Nippon Cable Co., the licensee of Doppelmayr technology in Japan. Nippon also owns several Japanese ski resorts and a 25 percent stake in Whistler Blackcomb.
News Roundup: Auction
- Sun Peaks applies for a permit to replace Crystal with a Doppelmayr fixed grip quad in a new alignment. The mountain is also getting its fifth James Niehues trail map.
- Ski Santa Fe and Sugar Mountain are getting new Niehues maps as well.
- Windham’s retired Wonderama triple is up for grabs.
- Granite Gorge, New Hampshire is listed for sale at a public auction July 8th but the ski area says it won’t happen.
- Hermitage Club President Harper Sibley resigns, citing an “unworkable” reopening plan. The bankruptcy case will proceed in a Vermont court.
- 85 year old Willy Garaventa recalls how the Squaw Valley tram project propelled his family’s company to eventually become the world leader in aerial tramways.
- A Montana community considers a co-op model for its shuttered ski area.
- Timberline, West Virginia’s owner may liquidate the ski assets.
- Bretton Woods’ gondola cabins are now hanging.
- Because 27 lifts isn’t enough, Big Sky is working on two more in Moonlight Basin and on Flatiron Mountain.
News Roundup: Wrapping Up
- Winter Park’s Gondola becomes the third direct drive lift to open in as many weeks in the United States. As of October, there were zero!
- Pico is added to Ikon, bringing the pass to 40 mountains with a combined 474 lifts in the the US and Canada.
- The Hermitage Club won’t reopen until January at the earliest.
- The last of British Columbia’s seven new lifts debuts at Sun Peaks.
- I did a double take on this lift: a D-Line gondola with Carvatech cabins.
- The new American Flyer is very close to becoming the world’s longest bubble chair.
- Stratton’s new high speed quad is now set to open early in the new year.
- Skeetawk remains on track to become Alaska’s eleventh lift-served ski area next winter with a SkyTrans triple chair.
- An 8 year-old boy sustains only minor injuries falling 33 feet off a lift at Nordic Valley.
- The Colombian capital of Bogotá launches a $73 million urban gondola called TransMiCable.
- Frost Fire says it cannot open yet due to “contractual obligations with our chairlift,” a brand new Skytrac quad.
- Big Sky brings high speed access to the southern flank of Lone Peak with Shedhorn 4.
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