Northeast Region Statistics

[EPB]

So I had a slow week last week and decided to do some research and make some lists of ski area statistics that I liked thought were somewhat relevant for comparison. Granted, much of this stuff won't matter for a whole host of reasons that cannot easily be put into an excel spreadsheet. I thought it would serve as a good antithesis to the SKI mag polls that are out.

Numbers were found using ski resorts web pages or pages such as skinh. If information was not readily available, I put in a google search and tried to compare the few numbers that I could. Please let me know if I have errors that you can spot. I also kept track of ski areas that had lifts longer than 5000 feet and ski areas that had lifts that served greater than 1700 feet of vertical as I appreciate long runs. My other, more comprehensive charts are pretty difficult to copy from excel.... Enjoy.


Top 20 Snowfall
1 Jay 372 VT
2 Stowe 333 VT
3 Bolton 312 VT
3 Smuglers Notch 312 VT
5 Sugarbush 264 VT
6 Mont Grands Fonds 256 QC
7 Killington 252 VT
7 Le Massif 252 QC
9 Mad River Glen 250 VT
10 Le Valinouet 236 QC
10 Vallee Taconique 236 QC
12 Val d'Irene 234 QC
13 The Balsams 225 NH
13 Mont Edouard 225 QC
13 Saddleback 225 ME
16 Burke Mountain 217 VT
17 Bretton Woods 200 NH
17 Okemo 200 VT
17 Sugarloaf 200 ME
17 Whiteface Mountain 200 NY
17 Wildcat Mountain 200 NH

Top 20 Vertical
1 Whiteface Mountain 3340 NY
2 Killington 3050 VT
3 Sugarloaf 2820 ME
4 Smuggler's Notch 2610 VT
5 Sugarbush 2600 VT
6 Gore Mountain 2537 NY
7 Le Massif 2526 QC
8 Stowe 2360 VT
9 Sunday River 2340 ME
10 Cannon Mountain 2200 NH
10 Okemo 2200 VT
12 Jay Peak 2153 VT
13 Tremblant 2116 QC
14 Wildcat Mountain 2112 NH
15 Loon Mountain 2100 NH
16 Mont Sainte Anne 2050 QC
17 Mad River Glen 2036 VT
18 Waterville Valley 2020 NH
19 Burke Mountain 2011 VT
20 Stratton Mountain 2003 VT

Top 20 Acreage
1 Killington 752 VT
2 Sunday River 669 ME
3 Tremblant 654 QC
4 Sugarloaf 651 ME
5 Okemo 632 VT
6 Stratton 600 VT
7 Mount Snow 588 VT
8 Sugarbush 578 VT
9 Stowe 485 VT
10 Mont Sainte Anne 465 QC
11 Ski Bromont 450 QC
12 Bretton Woods 434 NH
13 Le Massif 410 QC
14 Jay Peak 385 VT
15 Loon Mountain 326 NH
16 Stoneham 326 QC
17 Attitash 310 NH
18 Smuggler's Notch 310 VT
19 Bolton Valley 300 VT
20 Bromley 300 VT

 

[Geoff]

I guess I've just added Mont Grands Fonds to my Quebec City list.

Jay Peak claims 355". I'm not sure where you got the larger number from.

 

[deadheadskier]

10 Le Valinouet 236 QC
10 Vallee Taconique 236 QC
12 Val d'Irene 234 QC
13 Mont Edouard 225 QC

Where did you get the info on these areas? I don't see them on skitown.com. It's a site I frequent to check out areas I'm not familiar with.

http://www.skitown.com/resortguide/statemap.cfm/PQ

 

[EPB]

Where did you get the info on these areas? I don't see them on skitown.com. It's a site I frequent to check out areas I'm not familiar with.

http://www.skitown.com/resortguide/statemap.cfm/PQ

I used Zoneski.com for some direction. It's a Quebecois site similar to alpinezone. I can speak a decent amount of french, so following it isn't all that bad. The lesser known Quebec areas were difficult to find.

As for Jay, ski Vermont claims Jay receives 31 feet,

 

[UVSHTSTRM]

Couple things, I think Sugarloaf now has over 850 skiable acres, should be noted that Sunday River has maybe 1500ft of continous vert, maybe I am wrong and they do have a trail or two that can get you more than that. Also I have always wondered, places like Jay and Stowe get western style snow totals, Jay has similar temps to Sugarloaf (guessing Stowe does as well), but yet Sugarloaf seems to have have more snow in the woods and on natural trails later into the season.....just curious, am I wrong if not how is it that Stowe and Jay get nearly twice as much snow as Sugarloaf, but yet not have snow any later into the season? It's just I have been to Sugarloaf in mid late April and they have nearly all trails open (and yes often the woods are still skiable), and then I look at places like Jay and they have 7 trails open and a look at their photos of the day and the place is almost completely void of snow (could just be the picture not capturing the right angle to show the snow at the higher elevations, etc.)

 

[deadheadskier]

I maybe wrong, but I think in general, Sugarloaf is a 'colder' mountain than Jay or Stowe, which helps preserve late season snow. Also, Sugarloaf tends to get the most amount of snow February through April, where as Northern VT it is mid - December through mid - March

 

[EPB]

Couple things, I think Sugarloaf now has over 850 skiable acres, should be noted that Sunday River has maybe 1500ft of continous vert, maybe I am wrong and they do have a trail or two that can get you more than that.

This seems accurate to me. It's tough to try to come up with "true" vertical numbers, so I just as soon decided not to bother. Maybe it would be helpful to have a list of resorts by the vertical of their chairlift that covers the most vertical feet. That list would probably be surprising and fun to compare with the one I've created.

As for Sugarloaf, the snow seems deep late into the season as it does at Wildcat too. Both areas report roughly 200 inches, but it sure seems to stick. I believe the new acreage total at Sugarloaf is 921, but I might have that wrong. I was hesitant to count it yet because it is difficult to know if the project will be completed in time for winter, and it's hard to know how much skiing is actually available. As I'm sure you noticed, Sugarloaf and Smuggs are adjusted to not show their boundary to boundary totals. The new expansion will be difficult to classify as far as B2B esque or truly developed. For now, I've omitted it.

 

[EPB]

PS Here's a breakdown of states' appearances in the top 20 lists.

Top 20 Appearances
1 Vermont 28
2 Quebec 14
3 New Hampshire 10
4 Maine 6
5 New York 3
6 Massachusetts 0

 

[skiadikt]

epb, don't know if you're aware of an interesting site called best snow.net at http://webpages.charter.net/tcrocker818/ which has a ton of snow data collected & analyzed over the years. for the most part the numbers are similar to yours except for stowe for reasons that are explained.

regarding the ski mag polls, their criteria has been discussed in depth in another thread but looking over the results, one need only look at alta & deer valley. alta finished 28th overall, but was #1 in snow, #1 overall satisfaction, #5 challenge & #8 in terrain variety - things that probably matter most to the more hard core skier/rider. deer valley was #1 overall, finishing #1 in grooming, service, on mountain food, lodging, dining, access and #2 in family programs, lifts, weather ... in the east, #1 tremblant and #19 jay break down similarly.

 

[UVSHTSTRM]

This seems accurate to me. It's tough to try to come up with "true" vertical numbers, so I just as soon decided not to bother. Maybe it would be helpful to have a list of resorts by the vertical of their chairlift that covers the most vertical feet. That list would probably be surprising and fun to compare with the one I've created.

As for Sugarloaf, the snow seems deep late into the season as it does at Wildcat too. Both areas report roughly 200 inches, but it sure seems to stick. I believe the new acreage total at Sugarloaf is 921, but I might have that wrong. I was hesitant to count it yet because it is difficult to know if the project will be completed in time for winter, and it's hard to know how much skiing is actually available. As I'm sure you noticed, Sugarloaf and Smuggs are adjusted to not show their boundary to boundary totals. The new expansion will be difficult to classify as far as B2B esque or truly developed. For now, I've omitted it.

Good points. Oh and great list.

 

[St. Bear]

Are the snowfall numbers averages, or from last year? I thought Wildcat averaged around 230ish, but I know last year was a light year for them.

 

[x10003q]

The Gore Mountain web site shows skiable acres at 428.

 

[EPB]

The Gore Mountain web site shows skiable acres at 428.

I completely missed that one when making my top 20 list. Thank you.

As for Wildcat, I've found 174 inches a few years ago. Now they report 16+ feet (190something inches) and 200 inches on brochures and the website.

 

[billski]

Nice job EPB, makes for interesting discussion.

You might want to review Tony Crocker's numbers. He's is very obsessive about getting the verticals and snowfall number correct. He counts skiable and verticals base from the top to bottom of chair, not to the the peak or parking lot. Granted some are nits, but some are substantial.
http://webpages.charter.net/tcrocker818/

I've tangled with Tony before when my numbers were wrong, and got beat up pretty badly. He's absolutely correct in his numbers, and begs to differ with what the marketeers will tell you.

Case in point is Killington, where you will never see 3000 sustainable drop. Since it covers a range of mountains, some base area elevations are significantly different from others. So be careful when you quantify what you mean by vertical.

 

[EPB]

Nice job EPB, makes for interesting discussion.

You might want to review Tony Crocker's numbers. He's is very obsessive about getting the verticals and snowfall number correct. He counts skiable and verticals base from the top to bottom of chair, not to the the peak or parking lot. Granted some are nits, but some are substantial.
http://webpages.charter.net/tcrocker818/

I've tangled with Tony before when my numbers were wrong, and got beat up pretty badly. He's absolutely correct in his numbers, and begs to differ with what the marketeers will tell you.

Case in point is Killington, where you will never see 3000 sustainable drop. Since it covers a range of mountains, some base area elevations are significantly different from others. So be careful when you quantify what you mean by vertical.

Yeah. I put a few numbers in there knowing for sure that they were invalid. Two that come to mind are Attitash and Wildcat. Attitash's summit triple serves 1673 feet of vertical. It as the highest top and lowest base of any lift at Attitash. They claim 1750. Wildcat is similar. The quad services 2041 and the mountain claims 2112. I thought it would be easier to compare the claims to get numbers out there. I like the idea of the top 20 areas by most vertical served by one lift. PS if you don't count the Starship, Killington's biggest vertical is the K1, which also serves 1673 feet.

"True" vertical would be nice too. Cutting off base developments like the snubber at Sugarloaf and the Cabriolet at Tremblant would give better numbers. If I have the time, Id eventually like to add both totals to my list. Got any other ideas? I'm glad that there are other "numbers guys" here.

 

[Highway Star]

Case in point is Killington, where you will never see 3000 sustainable drop. Since it covers a range of mountains, some base area elevations are significantly different from others. So be careful when you quantify what you mean by vertical.

It is quite easy to ski entire Killington top to bottom without going up hill or riding a lift. What are you talking about?

 

[deadheadskier]

It is quite easy to ski entire Killington top to bottom without going up hill or riding a lift. What are you talking about?

same could be said for Sunday River. Yes you can ski 2350 vertical feet there, but it's long and boring. Not exactly what I would call 'sustained'.

Skiing K peak all the way down to the Gondola has plenty of areas of suck.

 

[St. Bear]

As for Wildcat, I've found 174 inches a few years ago. Now they report 16+ feet (190something inches) and 200 inches on brochures and the website.

You'd think I'd pick up on something as obvious as that.

You would think.

 

[WWF-VT]

Skiing K peak all the way down to the Gondola has plenty of areas of suck.

+1

 

[riverc0il]

I suspect the reason the Cat and the Loaf retain snow longer than NoVT areas that get more inches is a combination of temperature, vertical, and aspect. Most VT areas that have over 2k vert have base areas below 2k feet unlike a place like Wildcat. Not sure about the Loaf but I would bet above the Snubber at the main lodge is pretty close to 2k.

I like the idea of a similar vert list but rather with most realistic vert not involving excessive flats or traverses such as those at Killington and Sunday River. Jay and Sugarbush sure don't feel any where near as much vert as they both claim due to flats and run outs. Smuggs at 2610 probably goes down to Morse, also not realistic. Loaf includes the Snubber, Stowe includes the Toll House. Some places this type of thing would be splitting hairs but most of the big mountains get to hype vertical even though no one realistically ever skis that vertical unless they make a special point to do so out of masochistic punishment.