- Vail Resorts reports annual skier visits down 9.5 percent, net income down 14 percent, EBITDA down 1 percent and season pass sales down 3 percent in units but up 3 percent in dollars. The company announced no new 2025 lift projects and will lay off 14 percent of corporate staff along with limited operational staff.
- Hatley Pointe, North Carolina retires the Laurel double, plans to build a new chairlift eventually.
- County planners unanimously reject the Shadow Mountain Bike Park proposal in Colorado.
- Sleeping Giant, Wyoming will hibernate again this winter.
- Huff Hills, North Dakota reaches a one year agreement to operate this winter.
- Aspen’s proposal to replace Lift 1A remains alive.
- Whitetail, Pennsylvania to sell Hall chairs from Jib Junction.
- Leitner to build a seven station urban gondola in Morella, Mexico for $100 million.
- Mexico’s President and President-elect inaugurate a six station urban gondola line by Doppelmayr in Mexico City.
- A Hezbollah rocket strikes a chairlift in Israel held territory.
- Snowbird turns an old tram cabin into a bar.
- Sandia Peak proposes replacing Chair 1.
- Tamarack scales down expansion plans to seven new chairlifts and an extension of the Wildwood Express with no new gondola.
- The under construction One&Only resort with a two station gondola connecting to Big Sky Resort catches fire.
- Ever optimistic Les Otten still aims to re-open The Balsams with three new chairlifts in phase one.
Vail Resorts
News Roundup: Megaprojects
- Alterra details its 2024 capital plan, totaling $300+ million with six new chairlifts.
- Following yesterday’s announcement of three new lifts this year, Deer Valley also outlines the seven detachable lifts opening in 2025 for a total of 10 in two years (counting the two section gondola as two.)
- A presentation details massive construction underway at Deer Valley.
- Deer Valley will hold an open house to update the community on construction and future plans next Thursday.
- Park City continues to explore a gondola connection from Main Street to Deer Valley.
- Speaking of megaprojects, here are some unofficial photos of the two D-Line gondolas with six total stations under construction at Big Sky.
- The world’s largest indoor ski area opens near Shanghai with a detachable chairlift and gondola from Poma.
- Parks Canada approves the Banff Gondola owner’s purchase of the Jasper SkyTram.
- A Swiss newspaper reports Alterra may be as interested as Vail in acquiring Swiss resorts.
- Vail Resorts to report earning September 26th, traditionally when lift projects are announced for the following year.
- Vail to sell Wildcat Express gondola cabins, run only chairs in the future.
- Solitude will auction 29 chairs from the Moonbeam quad, which operated only four years.
- Wachusett orders a Doppelmayr UNI-G six pack to replace the Polar Express.
- A rider is injured and airlifted after falling while boarding Schweitzer’s Great Escape Quad.
- Five years since the Sea to Sky Gondola‘s haul rope was first cut and four years since it was cut again, police are still looking for the perpetrator(s).
- Maintenance workers on London’s IFS Cloud Cable Car plan a strike.
News Roundup: Lost & Found
- New York lost ski area Big Tupper to be auctioned this fall.
- Partially lost Ski Chantecler, Quebec gains new, local ownership.
- Big Sky constructs a striking glass enclosure over the Lone Peak Tram‘s bottom terminal.
- Red Lodge sells former Alta Sunnyside chairs.
- Bluewood seeks Forest Service approval for a base to summit detachable.
- Unspecified improvements are coming to recently reopened Sandia Peak Ski Area.
- Fatzer acquires Rigging Specialties of Canada.
- The first Leitner-Poma bubble chairs in Canada land at Sunshine Village.
- Hear the inside story of how the Yellowstone Club supports a $100+ million annual operating budget and 20 lifts with only 70,000 skier visits.
- Swiss media report Vail Resorts may be in talks to buy Laax.
News Roundup: Mountain Planet 2024
- MND posts a replay of its Orizon product launch at Mountain Planet.
- Doppelmayr and Poma release their annual yearbooks.
- Poma launches an open air gondola concept where passengers will stand harnessed.
- Doppelmayr wins a $115 million contract to build a 3S and 10 passenger gondola in Chamonix.
- Okanagan Gondola receives final approval for construction near Kelowna, BC.
- The Highlands, Michigan will auction chairs for charity.
- Turkey arrests multiple people over last week’s fatal gondola incident.
- Jackson Hole says goodbye to Sublette.
- Opposition emerges to Deer Valley’s proposed Lift 7.
- Quebec Mountain Resorts Company, owner of Mont Grand-Fonds and Mont Lac-Vert, offers to buy Mont-Sainte-Anne and Stoneham from Resorts of the Canadian Rockies, says it would invest tens of millions in new lifts and snowmaking.
- Vail Resorts reports skier visits were down 7.8 percent this season but revenue was up. Same story for 24-25 season pass sales with units pacing down but revenue up.
- Bluewood, Washington looks to replace Skyline with a detachable quad.
News Roundup: Above & Beyond
- A new park map shows where Legoland New York’s gondola will go.
- A skiing preview of Deer Valley Expanded Excellence.
- The Colorado Sun embeds with departments who work all night to make Winter Park run.
- Afton Alps removes Chair 18 to make way for a tube park.
- Vail Resorts reports season-to-date skier visits are down 9.7 percent and lowers earnings guidance.
- From the classifieds: a 1987 Poma Quad for sale.
- Doppelmayr assumes patents needed for Autonomous Ropeway Operation (AURO) installations in the USA.
- Kimberley, BC files a new master plan.
- MND to make an announcement on April 16th.
- Upon learning of a young guest named Reid with a phobia of chairlifts, Stevens Pass staff spring into action, giving him a full day tour of mountain operations and making him an honorary lift operator.
- Red Lodge Mountain closes the Cole Creek quad due to a component failure within the lift terminal structure.
- A high speed quad is rope evacuated at Burke Mountain.
- Flat Top Flyer at Powderhorn remains closed awaiting delivery of parts.
- Sugarloaf closes King Pine for whatever this “mechanical problem” is.
- Guests were stuck on Blackcomb’s new gondola for hours yesterday.
- The OITAF World Congress for Ropeways is coming to Vancouver June 17-21.
- Leitner has reportedly paid more than $16 million in settlements to families of victims of the 2021 Stresa-Mottarone tram disaster.
- A D-Line gondola in Austria will run entirely on solar energy produced on site this summer.
- Grouse Mountain provides a gondola construction update.
- A raccoon rides Sugarbush’s Village quad.
- Costs double for the proposed gondola-served transit center at Steamboat.
- Also at Steamboat, Leitner-Poma appears to have won the contract to replace Sunshine Express.
- Leitner-Poma also appears to have upcoming projects at Big Bear Mountain Resort, Snowbasin and Wasatch Peaks Ranch.
- Chapman Hill will replace its main rope tow with a Leitner-Poma platter.
- Wachusett nears a decision to replace Polar Express with a six pack.
- The Town of Alta passes a resolution opposing the Little Cottonwood Canyon gondola.
- Red River shares renderings of its upcoming Copper Chair, will sell retiring Riblet chairs.
News Roundup: Legoland Gondola
- Nordic Valley should know by March whether Apollo can be repaired or must be replaced. Bridger also remains out of service.
- Wasatch Peaks Ranch resolves its dispute with residents, can resume construction.
- Alterra closes a $3+ billion fundraising round with proceeds going to “building out existing properties plus possible property acquisitions.”
- At Mt. Bachelor, Northwest Express loses its electric motor, will run on diesel at reduced speed for much of the season.
- Big White’s Black Forest Express suffers a similar issue but is back on electric.
- A fan video shows construction has begun on a new Leitner-Poma gondola at Legoland New York.
- Gore Mountain plans to replace all 73 cabins on the Northwoods Gondola with new Sigma cabins at a cost of $3,055,977.
- Heavenly admits responsibility for leaving a guest stranded overnight on a gondola last week.
- A French tram where empty cabins crashed into the stations in 2021 will reopen next year with all new cabins and other upgrades.
- An unseated passenger incident at Mammoth makes global news.
- Politicians fight against a gondola in Los Angeles.
- The New Yorker runs a long-form story on Jay Peak’s EB-5 debacle.
- Bloomberg chronicles Vail Resorts’ trials and tribulations in the Northeast.
- Multiple lifts suffer down time at Park City.
- Roland Bartholet will depart as CEO of Bartholet this month but remain on the board.
News Roundup: Rough Week
- A ski patroller dies at Titus Mountain, New York in an accident involving a chairlift.
- Bittersweet, Michigan says last week’s lift incident was caused by high winds.
- A 15 year old dies after falling from a lift at Sommet Morin Heights, Quebec.
- Hickory, New York to open this weekend for the first time in years.
- Sandia Peak works toward doing the same.
- Sleeping Giant, Wyoming won’t open this season.
- Neither will Misty Ridge, Alberta.
- A viral video shows chairs stacking up on a de-roped lift in France.
- Nordic Valley reopens after a lodge fire shuttered the resort.
- Doppelmayr and Mantis Ropeway Technologies secure regulatory approval for unmanned chairlift unloading stations in Austria and Switzerland.
- The Mantis system is also undergoing testing in Canada.
- Leitner Ropeways provides significant compensation to the families of 14 people who died in a 2021 Italian tram incident.
- Vail Resorts reports North American early season skier visits declined 16.2 percent but lift and ski school revenue were up.
- Hundreds sign a petition urging Powder Mountain to maintain public access to two existing and one future chairlift planned to go private.
- PowMow asks the public to weigh in where the outgoing Paradise Quad should be reinstalled.
- Double Diamond/Southern Cross at Stevens Pass closes for repair.
News Roundup: Utah, Utah, Utah
- Wasatch Peaks Ranch is ordered to temporarily halt construction and sales while a court considers a zoning dispute.
- Deer Valley Expanded Excellence lift construction is set to begin this summer.
- Park City Mountain’s proposed Sunrise Gondola project will go to a public hearing Tuesday night.
- Vail Resorts reports pass sales increases, plans to build the Sunrise Gondola in 2025.
- Nonprofits and individuals sue the Utah Department of Transportation seeking to stop the Little Cottonwood gondola.
- With numerous projects in the pipeline, Skytrac is hiring lift construction project managers.
- Red River proposes replacing the Copper double.
- Hatley Pointe, North Carolina teases new lifts over the next 3 to 5 years.
- Hickory to join Indy Pass, reopen lifts with funding from Indy Pass and Unofficial Networks.
- The cost of the proposed Dodgers Stadium Gondola in Los Angeles rises to an estimated $500 million.
- Mt. Spokane debuts a new trail map by VistaMap.
- A New York politician proposes exempting lift projects from state sales tax to match tax free purchasing enjoyed by state-owned resorts.
- James Coleman joins the Ski Utah podcast to talk about the rapid growth of Mountain Capital Partners.
- Montana Snowbowl lifts are certified to run again.
- Busch Gardens Tampa teases a reopening of its VonRoll gondola closed for four years.
News Roundup: Gondola Gallery
- Troll, British Columbia secures a million dollar grant to double ski terrain with a new T-Bar next year.
- Snowbasin may not host events for a second Utah Olympics but Deer Valley and Park City are on board.
- Baltimore explores building a harbor crossing gondola.
- Big Sky’s stunning new tram will open December 19th.
- Vail Resorts debuts gondola cabin artwork by diverse artists at Park City and Stowe with Whistler Blackcomb up next.
- Vail brings lift mechanics from Indiana, Minnesota and Ohio to help finish the Mountaineer at Attitash.
- A rigging mishap sets back reopening of Chair 4 at Cuchara.
- Sugar Bowl replaces two damaged towers on the Crow’s Peak triple.
- Sierra at Tahoe modifies lift towers due to wind load changes from Caldor Fire tree removal.
- Discovery, Montana completes a solar power facility adjacent to the Anaconda triple capable of providing 65 to 70 percent of the lift’s energy needs.
News Roundup: Mineral Basin
- Snowbird proposes replacing both Mineral Basin and Gadzoom with six packs; Brighton plans a six passenger chondola in a new alignment.
- In Quebec, Mont Grand-Fonds plans a new lift for next year.
- Indy Pass adds 20 new North American downhill resorts including Big White, Montana Snowbowl and Shames Mountain.
- SilverStar buys 21 more cabins for the Summit Express Gondola.
- More Omega cabins show up at Homewood for the postponed Madden Gondola.
- Skytrac will build Mt. Ashland’s next new lift.
- Rabbit Hill, Alberta sells to new owners.
- Vail Resorts reportedly shops for another Swiss resort.
- Black Mountain, New Hampshire won’t open this season.
- Sugarbush confirms new Heaven’s Gate for 2024.
- Alterra buys Mike Wiegele Heli Skiing.
- Snowriver’s new map shows several new and removed lifts.
- An Austrian ski resort says its 15 passenger pulse gondola was sold to a ski resort in Canada.
- Smugglers’ Notch will continue studying a gondola connection with Stowe.
- Buck Hill and Red Lodge announce public chair sales.
Lift Blog 
