Big Burke announcement

[from_the_NEK]

anyone got a pic of the pond in it's current state?


Crotched's pond runs out fairly routinely to start the season and they have to suspend snowmaking operations. I don't believe they have the ability to pump from a river. It fills up fairly fast with a bit of rain. Once they get the base down on 100 acres, it no longer becomes an issue.

I'm just pointing this out to hopefully be optimistic for the Burke crew. Crotched is known for great snowmaking and while it's only 100 acres of terrain, I'm guessing Burke's snowmaking coverage is what? 150 acres with the rest being natural snow trails and glades to round out their acreage?

Now the key difference is that Crotched can light up the whole place with who knows how many fan guns. The story I've been told is they once fired up all of them one night to see if they could do it and the local electric utility called them and said if they don't turn some of the system off, they might cause a local brown out.

And Crotched Mtn has over 3 acres of pond. However, who knows what the total volume of water is.

My guess is that most mtns that have a serious snow making operation have at least 5 million gallons of water in a pond.

 

[Big Wave Dave]

god you guys are all serial complainers. Half of the Vermont ski areas arent open yet. We had one of the driest, warmest falls ever. Its amazing to me the amount of time some of you invest in complaining. If I had as negative opinions as alot of you, whether warranted or not, I wouldnt think of skiing at burke.

long story short one thing matters- having terrain open for xmas week. Everything else is window dressing.

One question I do have as clearly some of the people posting on here are way more familiar with the ski industry and what Buirke did than I am- what did they actually spend the $1mil on as stated in the Cal Record- and, why couldnt they rent another compressor/ I recall seeing these in the past and cant imagine they could not find the space if they were pressed.

 

[VTKilarney]

god you guys are all serial complainers. Half of the Vermont ski areas arent open yet. We had one of the driest, warmest falls ever. Its amazing to me the amount of time some of you invest in complaining. If I had as negative opinions as alot of you, whether warranted or not, I wouldnt think of skiing at burke.

You have to understand that there is a lot of history here. Nobody is complaining about the impact weather has had on snowmaking operations. The complaints are about the state of the system itself, including broken promises that have been made about improving the system. The bottom line is that the snowmaking capability is worse than it's been in a LONG time, and this was intentional. Yet we hear leadership say that they are "excited" by their system in its present state.

long story short one thing matters- having terrain open for xmas week. Everything else is window dressing.

And this is where Burke has failed over the last two years, and will fail this year. They simply can't get terrain open like they used to be able to. Last year the only New England ski areas over 1,000 vertical feet that had fewer trails open during Christmas were Dartmouth Skiway and Middlebury (if memory serves me correctly). But leadership is "excited" by what they see - even though they will be at the bottom of the trail count list again this year.

One question I do have as clearly some of the people posting on here are way more familiar with the ski industry and what Burke did than I am- what did they actually spend the $1mil on as stated in the Cal Record- and, why couldn't they rent another compressor/ I recall seeing these in the past and cant imagine they could not find the space if they were pressed.

They spent the money on fan guns and water pumping. I've heard conflicting reports as to who actually spent the money on the fan guns, but the money was spent. Those fan guns have yet to be turned on this year. The only benefit they will derive is when snow is being made on the training hill where they are located. This will free up compressed air to be used elsewhere. But this assumes that there is sufficient water, which has been a real problem. When they are not making snow on the training hill, there is no benefit at all to the overall system other than the fact that they relocated some low-e guns.

Simply put: Q Burke has a snowmaking system that would only be good at a hill a fraction of their size. They've made many promises to improve the system. From a practical perspective, these promises have been absolutely hollow. Therefore, they've had a really shitty product for the past three years until natural snowfall saves them. Yet management is "excited".

 

[thetrailboss]

god you guys are all serial complainers. Half of the Vermont ski areas arent open yet. We had one of the driest, warmest falls ever. Its amazing to me the amount of time some of you invest in complaining. If I had as negative opinions as alot of you, whether warranted or not, I wouldnt think of skiing at burke.

Yeah, you're right. They once again bragged about improvements that would open the mountain earlier than ever, and yet they now can only run 25 guns instead of 60 or so in 2011. You're right, nothing to see here.....

:roll:

long story short one thing matters- having terrain open for xmas week. Everything else is window dressing.

Talk to us then.

One question I do have as clearly some of the people posting on here are way more familiar with the ski industry and what Buirke did than I am- what did they actually spend the $1mil on as stated in the Cal Record- and, why couldnt they rent another compressor/ I recall seeing these in the past and cant imagine they could not find the space if they were pressed.

As probably said, booster pump for water.

 

[deadheadskier]

This is the problem. Burke can only seem to muster 25 or 30 guns at any given time. This means that when snowmaking conditions exist, the rest of the competition is blowing Burke out of the water. What we are going to see is Burke limping along when cold weather returns, gradually getting just a few trails open over the course of about three weeks of snowmaking. They will get trails open at a fraction of the pace that other hills will get them open.

Whether the problem is water or compressed air, Burke just doesn't have enough of what they need. This is mostly because Ary made a strategic decision to eliminate compressed air capacity. The water was just bad luck (if it's indeed true), whereas the lack of compressed air was intentional.

Reminds me of when I was a pass holder at ragged. Think it was 09 through 11. I ended up switching to Gunstock after because they were priced similar and the terrain expansion was so slow to start the season at Ragged.

Now, Ragged has since largely fixed the problem with millions in investment. I bet they've doubled their skier visits in the process. Ragged has mentioned a desire to build a hotel too, but made the decision to fix mountain operations first through both investment in facilities and seasoned personnel.

Pretty interesting case study of how to do things right (Ragged) vs how to do things wrong (Burke) coming from two areas with similar histories of mismanagement, antiquated facilities and lack of beds.

 

[thetrailboss]

Reminds me of when I was a pass holder at ragged. Think it was 09 through 11. I ended up switching to Gunstock after because they were priced similar and the terrain expansion was so slow to start the season at Ragged.

Now, Ragged has since largely fixed the problem with millions in investment. I bet they've doubled their skier visits in the process. Ragged has mentioned a desire to build a hotel too, but made the decision to fix mountain operations first through both investment in facilities and seasoned personnel.

Pretty interesting case study of how to do things right (Ragged) vs how to do things wrong (Burke) coming from two areas with similar histories of mismanagement, antiquated facilities and lack of beds.

Very interesting observation.

 

[deadheadskier]

, why couldnt they rent another compressor/ I recall seeing these in the past and cant imagine they could not find the space if they were pressed.

Straight up ignorance from Ary and arrogance that his way is the right way.

There has been direct communication to the mountain that they have an air capicity issue that could be easily addressed through renting compressors. They've denied having a problem.

 

[thetrailboss]

Straight up ignorance from Ary and arrogance that his way is the right way.

There has been direct communication to the mountain that they have an air capicity issue that could be easily addressed through renting compressors. They've denied having a problem.

Yep. Exactly.

 

[VTKilarney]

A friend of mine skinned up today and sent a photo from just below the summit. They've been pounding Upper Willoughby with snowmaking whenever temps have allowed and their improved system is really paying dividends. He tells me that he hasn't been this "excited" for a few years.

 

[halfpintvt]

Lyndon State College News 7 Reports the following:

BREAKING: The grand opening of the Q Burke hotel has been delayed and the hotel will not accept reservations until after January 15, according to resort officials. It was originally set to open next Friday. The Q Burke marketing team has confirmed this information, but did not provide additional comment.

 

[VTKilarney]

You heard it here yesterday! Well, kind of (in post 5229).

Given the snow conditions, I don't think that most guests will be "excited" to get their money back.

 

[Smellytele]

You heard it here yesterday! Well, kind of (in post 5229).

Given the snow conditions, I don't think that most guests will be "excited" to get their money back.

Were there many to begin with?

 

[VTKilarney]

Were there many to begin with?

Only half of the hotel was made available and there were still plenty of rooms left over Christmas break.

I consistently predicted that they were behind schedule. Masskier kept insisting that they would open on time. What a shock.

 

[thetrailboss]

Lyndon State College News 7 Reports the following:

BREAKING: The grand opening of the Q Burke hotel has been delayed and the hotel will not accept reservations until after January 15, according to resort officials. It was originally set to open next Friday. The Q Burke marketing team has confirmed this information, but did not provide additional comment.

WOW. That is a shock. They were insisting it WOULD be open. I bet that they pin this on the new manager(s). Not good.

 

[deadheadskier]

January 15th?

What an epic fail. Xmas week is the biggest week of the year.

 

[VTKilarney]

January 15th?

What an epic fail. Xmas week is the biggest week of the year.

They'll blame it on the State even though work never stopped.


.

 

[River19]

Hold the phones......JANUARY 15th? I thought they were talking DECEMBER 15th?

December 15th for skiing opening (if they make snow)? Missing the whole holiday season?

Huh?

 

[thetrailboss]

Hold the phones......JANUARY 15th? I thought they were talking DECEMBER 15th?

December 15th for skiing opening (if they make snow)? Missing the whole holiday season?

Huh?

January 15th for the Qhotel.


Sent from my iPhone using AlpineZone

 

[oldtimer]

January 15th confirmed by trying dates on the resy website. January 14th is no good. January 15th works--

sucks. not a huge fan of Ary, but we all want this to work for the good of the mountain.

 

[River19]

January 15th confirmed by trying dates on the resy website. January 14th is no good. January 15th works--

sucks. not a huge fan of Ary, but we all want this to work for the good of the mountain.

This.

I think, while being obviously very critical of the decisions and handling of many aspects of the plan and execution over the past couple years we all want the mountain to succeed. That is at the heart of the WTF lens we tend to view everything Q through. And it turns out we were right, which really sucks.

So we got a mountain with no ability to make snow. While all mountains are dealing with weather, those mountains are much more equipped to deal with aggressively making snow as soon as weather turns favorable. This has been a short coming of Q for the past couple years, Burke has struggled to not only get trails open without a large natural dumping but they really struggled to recover from mid season warm ups.

So no real snow making improvements despite assurances etc.

Months of "the Hotel is on schedule, get your holiday groove on, come for the December 13th celebration with two comedians etc.".......and that was going to be with a half open hotel.........and now.......no hotel opening this year. Christmas season......gone. New Years celebration opportunities.......gone.

By all accounts the first 25% of the 2014/2015 season was a disaster with many disgruntled Burkies.........everyone got lip service, they rolled out the talking head Stenger and for the next 10-12 months there were promises and assurances that 2015/2016 will be a fantastic year and the critical unofficial start of the season, Christmas Vacation, will be a raging success with new snow making and the grand hotel rocking and rolling. And that appears to be all bullshit.

The real losers here are not only the folks that bought into the promises of better early skiing, but anyone who was hoping to have another job up at the hotel. How can they plan to adequately and effectively staff a hotel opening mid season? You think talented hospitality folks are going to be unemployed in mid January? I don't have faith that Ary (really why has this guy not been kicked off the mountain......rhetorical of course) would ever bring on a full staff and pay them to hang out and wait for the opening. Maybe I'm wrong......but, we've been more right than wrong all along sadly.

And people ask why we are so negative on this forum.......if the most likely scenario is negative, then it is what it is. And we keep being proven right.

And hey......where is the "Burke Mountain Real Estate Marketing Dept" anyways? Should be a great time to buy.......lol