Truth in Snow Reporting: Mount Snow

Mount Snow said:

Truth in Snow Reporting

Our snow reporting goal is simple, transparency. No one should ever second guess what a mountain reports as its conditions, weather, trail surface or anything else. When you pick up a snow report at Mount Snow it should be trusted as if you wrote it yourself.

This is why over the past two seasons we have drastically overhauled our snow reporting philosophy. It began with a fundamental change to report percentage open as opposed to trails. It’s pretty simple, an acre is an acre but one trail can certainly be a lot different than another. We continued last season by revamping our trail map to what we believe is a more accurate trail depiction. When you ski from the top of the mountain to the bottom it should be on one trail, not a collection of upper’s and lower’s. We have reduced our trail count from 102 to 80. As well we no longer mark tree terrain, our trees are always open to those whose ability permits them to ride it.

In short, you come to Mount Snow for a getaway, not a hassle. Enjoy our 588 acres of the best quality snow on the east coast and know that when we say we have two feet of fresh powder we mean it. On the flip side when we say that it’s raining two inches, we’ll see you in Cuzzins for a drink!

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Source: http://mountsnow.com/the-mountain/snow-report/

That's pretty cool! They actually reduced their trail count by 20%! Has any other ski area done that recently? Interesting change in going to percent of acres open instead of number of trails. Obviously, they would inclined to change their reporting as acres open percentage would give them a higher percentage than trail since they reduced trails on the map by so much.

The big problem with this is always the dubious "boundary to boundary" policy and what should count as thick soft woods are never skiable any where. By not having on map glades and not reporting them as part of the acres, that certainly solves the problem. Given Mount Snow's location in far SoVT removed from the NoVT snow belt, again that plays to their advantage.

So there are advantages to Mount Snow's honesty. But even still, this seems like a bold new direction and I wonder if any other ski areas will follow suit?

Would love to see Stowe go back to the Great 48. I always respected that about Stowe for years. Now they represent the absolute worst of the worst in terms of inflated trail count. 116 trails my ass

Removing uppers and lowers doesn't hurt them as much as other areas, due to the trail layout.

While they say, "When you ski from the top of the mountain to the bottom it should be on one trail, not a collection of upper’s and lower’s," I believe they only have one trail under the new naming structure that fits that description for the full top to bottom vertical (Exhibition).

riverc0il said:

Source: http://mountsnow.com/the-mountain/snow-report/

That's pretty cool! They actually reduced their trail count by 20%! Has any other ski area done that recently? Interesting change in going to percent of acres open instead of number of trails. Obviously, they would inclined to change their reporting as acres open percentage would give them a higher percentage than trail since they reduced trails on the map by so much.

The big problem with this is always the dubious "boundary to boundary" policy and what should count as thick soft woods are never skiable any where. By not having on map glades and not reporting them as part of the acres, that certainly solves the problem. Given Mount Snow's location in far SoVT removed from the NoVT snow belt, again that plays to their advantage.

So there are advantages to Mount Snow's honesty. But even still, this seems like a bold new direction and I wonder if any other ski areas will follow suit?

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They rolled this out prior to the beginning of the '09-'10 ski season, and as someone who has been there about 90% of the weekends they've operated since that philosphy of snowreporting was implemented, it's been great, and very honest and transparent. The biggest thing to get used to was when the cut the trail count down and renamed some portions of trails. You were just used to a certain part of a trail being called X for a number of years and now it was called something else (For example one of Mount Snow's very popular Main face cruiser runs used to be the combination of the Ridge trail which fed into the Meadow trail, and now it's just called Ridge the entire distance - you know kind of like Stowe USED to name their trails )

If you're luck enough to be in the TV area of Outside TV/Channel 41 an catch the Snow Show which is broadcast live from the 2nd floor of the Mount Snow Base Lodge every Saturday + Sunday AM from 7 to 9AM, you'll see their snowreporter or members of the marketing department (or even sometimes the general manager, head of mountain ops, or the mountain manager) live doing the snow report and being sometimes brutally honest about the conditions

Nothing gets under my skin more than a dishonest trail report. Unfortunately it has become the industry standard to grossly exaggerate the amount of open terrain. The one mountain that I have seen that will give you a honest report is Magic. http://www.magicmtn.com/snowreport.php Good or bad you should know the actual trail count and what the true conditions are.

Very cool of MS. Acreage, while not a perfect indicator of a ski area's size, is far preferable to trail count. Sunday River should really follow suit; dump the uppers/lowers and quit naming super-short stretches of terrain.

Regarding acreage I've noticed that Smuggs claims 1000 acres yet doesn't claim to be the largest area in the east. Even the Loaf wont be that big when they're done expanding. How's that work?

MarkC said:

Nothing gets under my skin more than a dishonest trail report. Unfortunately it has become the industry standard to grossly exaggerate the amount of open terrain. The one mountain that I have seen that will give you a honest report is Magic. http://www.magicmtn.com/snowreport.php Good or bad you should know the actual trail count and what the true conditions are.

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Mad River Glen is also brutally honest with its snow reporting often times trying to spin it in a "it can be fun if you want it to be" tongue in cheek humor. I would also nominate Cannon and Jay (yes, Jay) for fairly accurate reports. Cannon actually under reports as I am almost positive they only measure at the base and Jay has gotten a lot better and is often brutally honest as well. Their ruler is now quite accurate as well.

I actually think many ski areas are changing up the industry standard of and stretching the truth on snow reports. I thought Mount Snow's page on accuracy in snow reporting was notable and commendable. In general, I think I see more honesty than I used to in reporting. Not in trail counts though. Mount Snow seems to be an exception bucking the trend. I think they should be pointed out and given a medal of honor for this change. Other ski areas take note: we see what you are doing and we don't like it.

Edd said:

Regarding acreage I've noticed that Smuggs claims 1000 acres yet doesn't claim to be the largest area in the east. Even the Loaf wont be that big when they're done expanding. How's that work?

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Perhaps they are using a boundary to boundary number. Smuggs is spread out over three peaks with a significant amount of the terrain between their marked trails being skiable.

Didn't some ski areas change trail counts for insurance reasons?

I think some credit has to be given to forums like this as well as twitter/facebook type social media. There is honest info out there now, so marketing depts have to compete with that. Plus social media is like a big megaphone for happy or unhappy customers, so there's more accountability.

As for honesty in reporting snow totals and such, that is great. As for reporting open acreage as opposed to trails, this has been discussed here before, and I don't see this as a big deal. Sunday River reports open trails, miles, and acreage. Why not just report all 3? This provides a more complete picture than any singular measure.

dmc said:

Didn't some ski areas change trail counts for insurance reasons?

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I've read (probably here) that patrol and operations like to have the trail network broken down into as many named sections as possible. Makes it easy to define where action is needed. Anyone care to verify?

Mapnut said:

I've read (probably here) that patrol and operations like to have the trail network broken down into as many named sections as possible. Makes it easy to define where action is needed. Anyone care to verify?

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That part I can totally see, although that's also making the assumption that the person reporting the incident knows what trail they're on in the 1st place

Riverskier said:

As for honesty in reporting snow totals and such, that is great. As for reporting open acreage as opposed to trails, this has been discussed here before, and I don't see this as a big deal. Sunday River reports open trails, miles, and acreage. Why not just report all 3? This provides a more complete picture than any singular measure.

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Agreed. As soon as people started coming back with pictures from the slopes, things changed. No longer could a week-old photo be considered.

I think they really bellied-up the honesty by putting live web cams on the slopes.

If you want a real report, AZ rocks. What I like about AZ is that you get different reports depending on the skier/boarder - bump guys, greenie beginners, smoking steeps, intermediate skiers, woods, etc. It's up to you to sort though it and determine what is "good" for your orientation. Unfortunately, I would argue most people don't do this, save for this crown/the obsessed/passionate types.

Mapnut said:

I've read (probably here) that patrol and operations like to have the trail network broken down into as many named sections as possible. Makes it easy to define where action is needed. Anyone care to verify?

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I was at Killington the season they went from 107 trails to 200 and something.:blink:

Alex

Lake Hopatcong,NJ

I presume that if they didn't have the upper/lower and comparable designations, entire trails would be stuck rated at the highest difficulty level at any point on the trail. with upper/lower designations they can more accurately reflect trail ratings. Without that, plenty of mountains may look a lot more intimidating to the average few times a year skier.

midd said:

I presume that if they didn't have the upper/lower and comparable designations, entire trails would be stuck rated at the highest difficulty level at any point on the trail. with upper/lower designations they can more accurately reflect trail ratings. Without that, plenty of mountains may look a lot more intimidating to the average few times a year skier.

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That's a good point. That logic also has the fortunate (for the ski area) side effect of increasing trail counts.

Riverskier said:

Sunday River reports open trails, miles, and acreage. Why not just report all 3? This provides a more complete picture than any singular measure.

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Agree. Ideally everyone would report all 3. I don't see any reason for Mount Snow to only report on acreage, unless they believe that gives them an advantage over their comptetition. It's kind of annoying, actually, to not have an idea of percentage of runs and the distance involved. I would prefer to see (open trails / total trails) plus open miles of terrain instead of just acreage, which is not a real useful statistic to see by itself.

I bet Snowshed has a lot of acres, but I'd be pissed if I showed up for '25 acres of skiing and riding' and that's all there was open.

patrol does not need upper and lower designations

I'm a patroler. we know our mountains well enough that we can use landmarks and well known features to describe where to send the sleds and patrolers when an accident occurs. The upper and lower designation is simply to inflate trail count. For example, Wachusett has upper and lower connifer when everyone knows its one trail.

tmcc71 said:

I'm a patroler. we know our mountains well enough that we can use landmarks and well known features to describe where to send the sleds and patrolers when an accident occurs.

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It certainly helps on the accident reports though, doesn't it?

There are valid reasons other than "just to inflate trail count" resorts have divided one trail into sections. One is terrain change. For example, at the Bush Upper Organgrinder is a black while Lower Organgrinder is a blue rated section. Also, most named sections have a trail intersection of some sort for exiting or entering so it definately can help ski patrol get to an incident faster if, of course, the guests know what trail they happen to be on.

Another example at the Bush is off of Gatehouse lift which services mostly green/blue terrain. Under the lift the trail is mostly a blue cruiser except for a pretty steep often moguled section called Waterfall, rated a black. If a guest has a trail map and is practicing good trail awareness they can exit this trail onto Sleeper another blue trail just above Waterfall therefore avoiding a steep moguled section that might be above their skill level and avoid a possible problem.

As far as using landmarks or trail features for ski patrol to get to an incident quickly I think for many trails those really do not exist. Especially for guests who are in distress. I would be interested to hear some examples other than a lift that you/guests use. Take an interstate highway, which accident will get a faster response time? A report that an accident happened near exit 15 or a report of accident that happened somewhere between Albany and Saratoga.

Faster response time in reaching someone by ski patrol or providing a safer trail layout can result in lower liability insurance premiums for a resort.

Regarding kmarts trail count going from 107 to 200, didn't that happen when kmart acquired Pico? I realize that Pico does not have 93 trails but I think that would account for a big chunk of the increase. Same as Mt Snow when it acquired Corinthia

I too had alot of respect for Stowe for sticking to their 48 trails for so long, I checked their new trail map recently and several trails had five diferent names but as mentioned most resorts have done this but maybe not to this extent.