AZ Challenge Special: MOUNT SNOW!

[thetrailboss]

Chris Lenois, the Communications Manager for Mount Snow Resort has agreed to take the 2006 Alpine Zone Challenge!!! This is your opportunity to ask questions, offer suggestions, or say some praise to the men and women who are in charge of the Northeast’s Ski Areas. Please post some suggested questions in this thread and we'll select ten to present for official responses.

Also please don't be offended if we edit/change your question for grammar, tone, or some other minor thing. In order to get in all of the questions we MAY merge some questions but we'll do our best to keep the substance of your question. If we don't get your question in, feel free to post a follow up after we get the results...we are encouraging the representatives follow the threads. :wink:

As always, please be respectful of Chris and keep it civil. Also, please refrain from asking specifics about skier visit numbers, financials, demographic information, etc. Mount Snow needs to be discrete about certain information.

We are honored to have Mount Snow join us for their FIRST AZ Challenge!!! :beer: Please take advantage of this special opportunity!


Ask away!

Mount Snow’s Profile

 

[thetrailboss]

Another special AZ Challenge for those who want to pass the "barren" times talking about skiing since it is so brown out there. We are working on getting Okemo and Smuggs on board real soon as well.

 

[thetrailboss]

Chris--

Mount Snow is a historic ski resort. It was known as a special place with some interesting lifts (the Flying Car) and other oddities before Pres Smith and SKI came in and made some big changes. What item from the past would you bring back? What is Mount Snow's current strength or strengths? What would you change?

 

[Jonni]

Thanks again Chris for taking time to answer some of our questions. Now, I haven't had been able to get down there as much as I would like to to experience some of the terrain you guys have to offer down there. My one question is what are your plans for the lift system on the mountain? I have heard rumors in the past of a High Speed Quad's replacing the Sunbrook lift and or replacing the Outpost and Challenger lifts out of the North Face. Is there any validity to any of these rumors?

 

[Tin Woodsman]

1) What is the status of the pipe to/from Somerset Reservoir for snowmaking? Is this in process with the various state and local agencies that have jurisdiction? If so, what is the timeline? Would it be fair to say that this project represents the #1 development priority behind which all other projects (including lift improvements) will have to fall in line?

2) Are there any legitimate prospects for terrain expansion to the south of Sunbrook, to the west of the North Face trails, or anywhere else?

 

[roark]

Are there any plans for improvements to the base lodge? Maybe some bathroooms not requiring the use of stairs?

 

[thebigo]

Skier days were reported to be down 18% last year at mount snow. How much of this can be attributed to the loss of haystack?

How else has the sale of haystack affected operations at mount snow?

This year you guys relocated your terrain park to nitro. What was the reason for this?

 

[maplevalleymaster]

Chris, thanks for taking the AZ challenge!

1.) I was curious why Mount Snow got rid of the cable car, the ice rink, the fountain mountain, and the pool. It seemed to bring people in because of its odd features. Also, Mount Snow was supposed to bring back Fountain Mountain for its 50th birthday and never did, or at least I never saw it.

2.) Last year, I heard you were going to try to make the Sunbrook Quad faster by taking off every other chair. Is this in effect for this year?

3.) I saw that you moved your terrain park to Nitro. This kind of seems foolish to me. Now beginnners and intermediate skiers are going to be forced down Titanium, which is never open and Mine Shaft which is a black diamond with a huge flat section that beginners are going to have to walk.

4.) I was also wondering why the Sundance chair is used once a year. There will be many times where the Summit Express and all the other base lifts will be crowded, and Sundance is not open. Why is this? Lack of workers?

5.) I heard last year during Fresh Tracks that Mount Snow had a contract with a local builder on redoing the Base Lodge. Is this going to happen?

 

[ski lover]

mount snow

Chris
I was wondering if you can tell us whether the new terrain park under the Nitro Express Lift will encompass the whole run down or will non-terrain park users still be able to ski down the run on skiers left heading down?

 

[drjeff]

Chris, thanks for taking the challenge! I've been a loyal MS skier now for over 20 years, and have now started in with the next generation of MS skiers in my family as my kids are in your daycare, and as of the 2nd week of January, your kids ski program as well! The question I have has to do with your childcare/kids ski program when compared to other ASC mountains. For my 3 year olf to be in your childcare and childrens learn to ski programs for the season, it is 2 seperate fees of almost equal amounts, whereas if my child was in the same programs at Killington, it would be 1 fee encompassing both childcare and the learn to ski program, all for roughly $1000 less for a season than Mt Snow charges.

Is there any reason why the same basic childcare/learn to ski programs at sister resorts are so drastically different in their pricing??

Also, is there any chance that a portion of the web page could be dedicated to a column/blog from the head of mountian operations about what the plan for the hill would be for the coming days, etc. i realize this is somewhat of the job of the snow reporter, but as a skier, I often find that the snowreporters as of late tend to bias their reports towards the status of the terrain features in the parks as opposed to some info about snowmaking plans/etc. for example today December 4th could have a post like "we're making snow on Chute, skyeline, Upper Canyons, River Run, Standard and Launch pad, once we're done with those, mother nature permitting we're moving the guns to upper exhibition, lodge and lower exhibiton, freefall and then on to deer run as we work our way over towards carinthia as we head towrads next weekend" That would be a great feature, especially in early season situations where trail opening are often based more on YOUR plans than mother natures.

Thanks again!

 

[Brettski]

Are there any plans for improvements to the base lodge? Maybe some bathroooms not requiring the use of stairs?

Huh? Where would that be?

 

[roark]

Huh? Where would that be?

Well, I usually just use the woods. But if I go in lodge not on the bar side the bathrooms are downstairs. Are there others by the bar? :dunce:

 

[2knees]

Well, I usually just use the woods. But if I go in lodge not on the bar side the bathrooms are downstairs. Are there others by the bar? :dunce:

If you go in the lodge, there is a bathroom right on the main floor near the ski shop. No stairs required.


Stupid question for Chris but its been on my mind. What does PDF stand for?

 

[tree_skier]

It's the initials of three of Walt's friends.

 

[drjeff]

Huh? Where would that be?

They do have some bathrooms downstairs (below the cafeteria level) adjacent to where the seasonal rental ski lockers are. Always nice and quite down there on a busy weekend day with the sound of hundreds of ski boots banging away just 1 floor above you

 

[thetrailboss]

Last day folks. Closing this tomorrow and sending them to Chris for answering.

 

[thetrailboss]

All done. Thanks.

 

[thetrailboss]

Just need to do a mea culpa here....Chris has been on the ball and asked me for the questions last Friday before close of business....and TB was in the NEK on vaca without internet. I've pulled the questions and sent them to him. Hope to hear back. So the delay is my fault and not Mount Snow. Sorry folks.