8 pack speculation

[Smellytele]

Boarding the K-1 today from the parking lot side was kind of a PIA but...

 

[WWF-VT]

I hope to never ski at a Northeast mountain that is crowded enough to justify installing an eight pack chair

 

[C-Rex]

I bet Jiminy Peak will eventually replace their 6-pack with an 8. If it'll impress the people from NYC and NJ, they'll do it.

 

[Highway Star]

Lift construction doesn't really work like that. A new lift means new towers, regardless of weight limits or anything of the like. Leitner-Poma, Doppelmayer, and all those other lift builders design their lifts from the ground up, so using old towers from a different type of lift, you'd never get any lift designer to go for it.

You're completely wrong. LOL.

 

[Highway Star]

Killington is seriously looking at an 8-pack to replace the snowdon quad. They would also add snowmaking to northstar trail and cut several more trails in that area.

 

[steamboat1]

Killington is seriously looking at an 8-pack to replace the snowdon quad. They would also add snowmaking to northstar trail and cut several more trails in that area.

That would be a shame, Northstar is one of my favorite trails on Snowdon. It still has an old style New England trail feel to it. It would be like what they did to Superstar & Skyelark over on Skye Peak. I don't really see a need for a 6 pack or 8 pack to replace the Snowdon quad. I very rarely see a line for the quad now. Can you imagine the traffic in mixing bowl or lower caper with an 8 pack serving Snowdon?

 

[ALLSKIING]

Killington is seriously looking at an 8-pack to replace the snowdon quad. They would also add snowmaking to northstar trail and cut several more trails in that area.

There going to combine low rider north star and patsy's into a super highway..

 

[Highway Star]

There going to combine low rider north star and patsy's into a super highway..

Also under consideration is cutting all the trees between chute, frolic, and caper, to create a giant "snowdon bowl"....!

 

[drjeff]

That would be a shame, Northstar is one of my favorite trails on Snowdon. It still has an old style New England trail feel to it. It would be like what they did to Superstar & Skyelark over on Skye Peak. I don't really see a need for a 6 pack or 8 pack to replace the Snowdon quad. I very rarely see a line for the quad now. Can you imagine the traffic in mixing bowl or lower caper with an 8 pack serving Snowdon?

Big picture down the road, if both the interconnect and the "village" happen, that side of K is going to be seeing a bunch more traffic than it does now and they'll need the capacity, be it a high speed 6 or 8 seater

 

[steamboat1]

Big picture down the road, if both the interconnect and the "village" happen, that side of K is going to be seeing a bunch more traffic than it does now and they'll need the capacity, be it a high speed 6 or 8 seater

That is a big "IF". They've been talking about both for decades. No closer to seeing that happen today then 20 years ago.

 

[drjeff]

That is a big "IF". They've been talking about both for decades. No closer to seeing that happen today then 20 years ago.

Not quite sure that K has had such an aggressive management in place in about 20 yrs either.

It seems like the days of K "shrinking" and bringing their game back towards the competition seem to have ended and K seems to be back into a position where all others are poised to follow.

I have said for years now, that the entire Northeast Ski Industry benefits from a K that is "strong" and "aggressive"

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[skiNEwhere]

That things looks so massive.....

I'd say loon would probably benefit most. The kangamangus quad gets so packed on the weekends that there would probably even be a line with an 8 pack

 

[skiNEwhere]

2 major problems I've noticed with 6 packs that I think ski area's overlook:

1. Queue management. What good is a lift that seats 6 plus if you can't fill all the seats? Lifties often times don't fill gaps. Many times I'll see a six pack with a long line, yet chairs going up the mountain with 4-5 people on it

2. Unloading. With more people on the chair, it's harder to coordinate with other skiers/riders when it comes to offload. The guy on the left side of the chair takes a right when unloading, and the guy on the right takes a left and....WHAM! There's a collision on the offloading ramping, the skiers go down, and the liftie is forced to stop the lift until the skiers can get up, grab there ski's/ poles, and get out of the way. The uphill capacity on paper may be higher on paper than the lift it replaced, but in reality the ACTUAL uphill lift capacity may be the same due to more stoppages.

 

[St. Bear]

Re: 6 or 8 pack vs gondola

Need to remember that those of us on a web forum discussing skiing are not the majority. Average Joe and Jane Skier definitely prefer a gondola. Not only does it get them out of the elements, there's an added sense of luxury compared to a chair lift.

A gondola also adds a "signature" lift to a resort, for what it's worth.

 

[drjeff]

2 major problems I've noticed with 6 packs that I think ski area's overlook:

1. Queue management. What good is a lift that seats 6 plus if you can't fill all the seats? Lifties often times don't fill gaps. Many times I'll see a six pack with a long line, yet chairs going up the mountain with 4-5 people on it

2. Unloading. With more people on the chair, it's harder to coordinate with other skiers/riders when it comes to offload. The guy on the left side of the chair takes a right when unloading, and the guy on the right takes a left and....WHAM! There's a collision on the offloading ramping, the skiers go down, and the liftie is forced to stop the lift until the skiers can get up, grab there ski's/ poles, and get out of the way. The uphill capacity on paper may be higher on paper than the lift it replaced, but in reality the ACTUAL uphill lift capacity may be the same due to more stoppages.

Agree with this!

From my own personal experience at Mount Snow the past 2 seasons since the Bluebird Express was installed, it took a good season and a number of line queue configurations to come up with the proper design and queue management staffing to get a system in place that the vast majority of the time puts 6 people on the load line when the crowds are there! If during a busy time a chair isn't going up full it tends to be because a person/people already paired up chose to selfishly wait for their own chair

As for unloading, Mount Snow realized that during peak times they need to station an ambassador in the immediate unloading area to "direct traffic" and help ensure that people exit straight off and not say have the person sitting on the far right side of the chair cut hard left across the path of the other five people on the chair.

It was a trial and error thing to figure out a dependable way to get 6 people on/off for sure. I'd expect a bit more of a challenge for an 8 seater!

The one thing that I would add that would make unloading a 6 or 8 seater easier for all is to have, at least for 100 feet or so just a straight unloading trail - no immediate options to take a trail to the right or a trail to the left, just keep going straight for a bit to clear the unloading area

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[steamboat1]

Not quite sure that K has had such an aggressive management in place in about 20 yrs either.

It seems like the days of K "shrinking" and bringing their game back towards the competition seem to have ended and K seems to be back into a position where all others are poised to follow.

I have said for years now, that the entire Northeast Ski Industry benefits from a K that is "strong" and "aggressive"

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Prez. Smith or ASC weren't aggressive? That's news to me. If anyone hasn't been aggressive it's Powdr & up until last year received a lot of complaints. If you think about it the only thing that has changed/new over the past year is public relations. The new Peak Lodge was planned well before the new management team stepped in. Powdr has bigger problems at Park City right now & really don't have anything to say about the village. Powdr doesn't own the land where the new village is proposed.

 

[octopus]

i was thinking it might be a bit of a clusterf@ck getting 8 off a lift. hate to admit it but i still sometimes get a bit out of control with 1 foot strapped in getting off the lift, and i've got many years under my belt snowboarding.

 

[steamboat1]

As for loading/unloading 6 packs Stratton seems to do a pretty good job getting the chairs full and they have 4 six packs. I'll admit Shooting Star (6 pk.) rarely see's any line at all.

 

[drjeff]

Prez. Smith or ASC weren't aggressive? That's news to me. If anyone hasn't been aggressive it's Powdr & up until last year received a lot of complaints. If you think about it the only thing that has changed/new over the past year is public relations. The new Peak Lodge was planned well before the new management team stepped in. Powdr has bigger problems at Park City right now & really don't have anything to say about the village. Powdr doesn't own the land where the new village is proposed.

The reality is that up until the last year or so, it was about 15yrs since ASC was managing K aggressively and about 20 since Pres Smith sold to Les Often/ASC - time flys!!

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[MadPadraic]

I'm the opposite of most in this thread. I find 6 packs uncomfortable and enjoy Gondolas. Of course, I have to take my board off of 1 foot so a second isn't that big of a deal. But seriously, I dislike 6 packs enough that I try to avoid them.