• Welcome to AlpineZone, the largest online community of skiers and snowboarders in the Northeast!

    You may have to REGISTER before you can post. Registering is FREE, gets rid of the majority of advertisements, and lets you participate in giveaways and other AlpineZone events!

Excessive crowds on the Modern day Ski mountain, Lift lines, Traffic lines & Parking issues. What, Where, When??

joshua segal

Active member
Joined
Jan 31, 2014
Messages
991
Points
43
Location
Southern NH
Website
skikabbalah.com
Traffic, Parking and crowded trails may be a problem, but liftlines, compared with the 60s and 70s are negligible. 40 minutes for a double chair on a weekend was not unusual and I waited once an hour and 3/4 for the single at MRG in 1971.
 

crank

Well-known member
Joined
Mar 3, 2005
Messages
1,357
Points
63
Location
CT
I haven't been to MRG on a weekend since waiting in that line in the 70's.

Last time I was in SLC for a big powder day I drove to Snow Basin to avoid LCC frenzy.
 

skiur

Well-known member
Joined
Jan 27, 2012
Messages
1,577
Points
113
I rarely spend more than 10 minutes in a lift line. I ski mostly at Killington and it is pretty easy to avoid liftlines if you know the mountain. I avoid holiday weekends like the plague and on the rare Saturday that I can't avoid the crowds happy hour starts early.
 

ThatGuy

Well-known member
Joined
Feb 10, 2021
Messages
1,602
Points
113
Location
America
Worst line, Magic on a Saturday powder day
Worst crowd, Mount Snow MLK day
Worst traffic, any weekend at Stowe
 

Great Bear

Member
Joined
Jan 3, 2022
Messages
86
Points
18
Worst line I ever experienced was at Park City on Presidents Day - not sure what year, maybe 4 or 5 years ago. The line at the Gondola from what used to be the Canyon Base area was insane - i don't' even remember how long it was but it was well over an hour.

Beyond that - Sunday River and Killington (along with many other of the larger eastern resorts) can be crazy on holiday weekends. With that said as others have mentioned, if you know the mountains you can usually avoid the lines to some degree (at least at Sunday River and Killington)
 

Boxtop Willie

Active member
Joined
Feb 5, 2009
Messages
144
Points
28
Loon, busy Saturday back in the mid-80s, consistently over an hour-long lift lines all day.
 

4aprice

Well-known member
Joined
Mar 14, 2008
Messages
3,892
Points
63
Location
Lake Hopatcong, NJ and Granby Co
Parking seems to be one of the bigger issues these days just about everywhere. Our local mountain here in the Pocono's is all pay. I have a hard time criticizing any of the areas for charging being a seasonal business. I don't mind parking in a remote lot and bussing over to the mountain like say Copper, but I hear the Airport Lot at Breck is a pain and a long haul to the skiing. Favorite lot is the Challanger (officially the Utah Jct Lot) at Mary Jane. Still free if you can get there early enough to get a spot. (We call it Winter Bark because of all the dogs running around and visiting tailgates).

Traffic? Been caught on I-70 (Colo) as well as I-87 (NY), just got to time your travels well. The canyon roads in Utah can be brutal but I get 1 week out there per year and usually only ski on weekdays.
 

Kingslug20

Well-known member
Joined
Oct 14, 2021
Messages
2,506
Points
113
Park city..wanted to get there early..everyone else had other ideas..1 hour wait for gondi
 

jimk

Well-known member
Joined
Sep 1, 2012
Messages
1,790
Points
113
Location
Wash DC area
Traffic, Parking and crowded trails may be a problem, but liftlines, compared with the 60s and 70s are negligible. 40 minutes for a double chair on a weekend was not unusual and I waited once an hour and 3/4 for the single at MRG in 1971.
As another old timer I absolutely concur with above. And unlike Joshua who is a New Englander, I'm from the mid-Atlantic. But I have the same memories that lift lines were much worse back in the day. I remember 1+ hour lines for a pair of parallel double chairs at Blue Knob, PA throughout the 1970s (where I was a season pass holder and frequent skier). This would occur routinely on most prime winter weekends. The overall number of skiers wasn't that enormously less than now, but everywhere had slower & fewer lifts and in the mid-Atlantic there were not as many places to ski as there are now.

There is a strange phenomenon going on right now caused by the megapasses. Large numbers of people are converging on a select few primo or convenient megapass mountains like Stowe, Vail, Park City, Steamboat, etc., especially on peak winter weekends. But secondary mountains are not that busy. In recent years I ski 3 or 4 days per week at Snowbird in the months of Feb-Apr. During those months there are only 5 or 10 days when the mtn has excessive crowds, exact number depends on how many good storm days bring out the powder panic;). Even on busy days I have strategies for avoiding bad lift lines; ski early, ski late, avoid certain lifts, go somewhere else. Last resort is stay home and ski another day.
 

Edd

Well-known member
Joined
Nov 8, 2006
Messages
6,537
Points
113
Location
Newmarket, NH
Back in the ASC days I hit SR on Saturdays and hit Killington and Mt Snow a couple of Saturdays. Those days are the worst crowds I’ve seen until discovering the religion of weekday skiing.
 

machski

Well-known member
Joined
Sep 5, 2014
Messages
3,702
Points
113
Location
Northwood, NH (Sunday River, ME)
Worst traffic was I-70 in a storm with avy control over the Eisenhower. I knew ths could happen, but the highway was a parking lot for 2 hours while control had the highway shutdown.

Worst crowd was Saturday of MLK weekend at Tremblant. That was brutal, skied off the Solei Quad even though terrain stunk over there to avoid crowds. The Edge pod was quite uncrowded too with good conditions so we stayed ovver there. The balance was an S show, TGV line was easily 60 minutes and everything else was minimum 30 North and South.
 

crank

Well-known member
Joined
Mar 3, 2005
Messages
1,357
Points
63
Location
CT
One of the worst lines I can remember was at Tremblant on a busy day trying to get back to the village side. Not only was the line super long but there were several Quebecois acting like they were in the Alps and trying to cut people off and jump the line.
 

MidnightJester

Active member
Joined
Oct 7, 2011
Messages
871
Points
43
any bojack fans here?

his thread titles remind of the Mt peanutbutter game show "Hollywoo stars and celebrities, what do they know? do they know things?? let's find out!"

You win for the longest thread titles.

So most of us getting to be Stars and Celebrities sounds about right. : )
Best Snow-hunting to all this Snow season..
 

deadheadskier

Moderator
Staff member
Moderator
Joined
Mar 6, 2005
Messages
27,921
Points
113
Location
Southeast NH
Killington Peak double in the 80s was pretty brutal. An hour was the norm on Saturdays

Modern times, MRG on weekends takes the prize for worst lines. Second place the Loaf on wind hold days. Both places I've experienced full ski days with only 7 or 8 runs total when it's been bad.
 

Zand

Well-known member
Joined
Dec 30, 2003
Messages
4,109
Points
113
Location
Spencer, MA
In the east, the most traffic I've dealt with is minor stuff like the Sunday afternoon backups in Wilmington and Ludlow. I've never been to Tremblant so can't comment on that, and I don't have an Epic Pass so I'll never need to deal with the Stowe bullshit. Liftlines, I grew up on Wachusett... enough said. Dealt with a couple busier days at Mt Snow and Loon. Worst parking situation I've dealt with is probably Killington in April when the crowds are still showing up but only KBL is open.

Out west I've only experienced minor traffic issues in Utah as I've never been there on a weekend. Taken an hour to get up to Alta a couple times. Never experienced the 4+ hour super shitty traffic though lol. My only time in Colorado ended on the Friday of PDW and I hit some traffic heading towards Denver, but the traffic going towards Summit looked like 95 in CT at rush hour. Been stuck in annoyingly long backups in Jackson too at the light. Worst liftlines in the west, Jackson during Covid for sure. Fucking brutal.
 

Dickc

Active member
Joined
Dec 5, 2013
Messages
567
Points
43
Location
Northeast Mass
I'll agree on the lift lines in the 60's & 70's. The Stowe double used to be routinly 45 minutes on any given weekend. Once it hit that, they fired up the old single next to it. Wildcat early and late season used to have EPIC lift lines. The gondola would be well over an hour, the t-bars were not too bad, and the Lynx double was 30 to 40 minutes mid mountain.
 
Top