NY's West Mountain Declares Bankruptcy

[thetrailboss]

http://www.saminfo.com/news/west-mountain-files-bankruptcy-protection

Does not sound good at all--neither where it has been or the guy who wants to run it.

It's too bad. Pretty accessible for a lot of folks. I wish I had skied there when I had a chance.

 

[ScottySkis]

I hate seeing any hill go under. I never made it here either.

 

[ss20]

Not good. Really not good if you check out the mountain's stats. A hill with 124 acres, 40 trails, and 1,100 vertical should not go under in any circumstances. Never skied there, or even heard of this place till now. Look's like a great mountain though for the intermediates.

 

[Hawkshot99]

First place I ever skied.

For a X-mas present my Aunt took me there and taught me to ski for a day.

 

[steamboat1]

Skied there quite a few times but not recently. Pretty good area when it has snow. They had a single chair like Mad Rivers on the lower slope, don't know if it's still there. Two other main lifts as I remember, the longest one being a double with the bar in the middle. The area was always like stuck in the middle. NYC & NJ. folks hit mostly the Catskill's for day trips so they didn't get that crowd. If they were going for longer trips Gore, Whiteface, southern & central VT. are not much longer of a drive. Most of the times I've skied there was to shorten the drive home from VT. They offered tickets for a few hours skiing at a reasonable rate. Great on Sunday mornings coming home so I'd be back in NYC for Sunday dinner. They offered night skiing which is a rarity in NY. Albany & Troy are close by, guess they didn't draw enough from there. It'd be a shame to see the mountain be another NELSAP.

 

[bigbog]

Think possibly another stake in the coffin is that...in addition to the good skiers wanting the Green Mtn's elevations, the shaped skis have made those higher elevations more accessible to more intermediates...than ever before, together with the whole, bigger is better, Park scene....
Damn...sure wish I would've gotten into skiing back in the day(s) 60s-mid70s...

 

[Cornhead]

Too bad, I came close to skiing there a couple years ago, I got a rain check at Whiteface, wind holds, imagine that, and was looking for a smaller place in the Daks to ski. I ended up in Queensbury driving towards West. As I approached the hill, I could see two WRODS with no one coming down the hill. I decided to cut my losses and head to VT. I can see them having a hard time drawing skiers with Gore right up the road. Their big attraction was night skiing, I would think.

 

[Warp Daddy]

Skied there several years including this past season . Good hill . Terrible or non existent snowmaking " Infrastructure extremely dated and not well maintained , lack of management was apparent .Things looked pretty shabby this season , the trails were not well taken care of and this was the case the prior year . It looked to me like the management killed a former cash cow and milked the sucker dry . Just sayin !


The vert is real and with the right management could be a decent contender within the region. For visitors it used to be a fun 3 rd day when skiing the Gore region .

Hopefully it somehow survives

 

[thetrailboss]

Sounds, and looks like, their lifts are quite old. You'd think it would do well being in the Lake George area, but I imagine that they are just not run well and they don't have the money to make it work.

 

[Warp Daddy]

It is very convienient to LG and just off the The Northway RT 87 . The hill itself has a few great racing trails and. There is potential for a great park halfpipe venue in one section of the lower slopes Moreover with the permanant pop in Glens Falls , Queensbury , Saratoga and the vicinity has potential foe both beer league, interscholastic and citizen racing as well as family skiing . Moreover with creative scheduling and PRICING by the hr during the mid day might attract that book of business from working professionals who might like to ski at lunch . Some of this has been tried by the previous mgt but the l
most critical needs are active mgt and upgrading mof both SNOWMAKING capability and lifts .

TB ur right on target with the LG tourism machine this SHOULD be a going operation when packaged with OTHER area winter activities and events

 

[drjeff]

Sounds, and looks like, their lifts are quite old. You'd think it would do well being in the Lake George area, but I imagine that they are just not run well and they don't have the money to make it work.

I first skied West Mtn back in December of 1980. It was the 2nd ski area I'd ever been too. It was my home mountain throughout the 80's and early 90's. I went through their weekend lesson programs and then their race team. My middle + high school ski clubs went there every Tuesday night from January through mid March. As tough as it may believe for AZ regulars, I might still actually have more career days on the slopes of West Mtn than Mount Snow

Even back in the winter of '80-'81 their lifts seemed "old" already

I really hope that it is able to operate as taking my kids there in the next season or 2 was one of the BIG ski things that I wanted to accomplish with them

 

[thetrailboss]

Hope that it is able to come back.

 

[deadheadskier]

I skied there once while a student at Skidmore in 1994. Not a bad 1000 vert hill.

I don't think it's proximity to Lake George matters all that much. Lake George is purely a summer/fall destination; it's a ghost town in the winter. Hell, even the Sagamore closes for over 6 months of the year and it's one of the grandest resorts in the east.

It's easy access and proximity to Albany gives it potential, but the problem is that Jiminy is such a better offering within the same distance. None of my Albany area friends even bothered with West for night skiing because of this reality and as has been mentioned, for day skiing, they'd prefer hitting Gore or some of the Southern VT areas.

Too bad to see it close though.

 

[4aprice]

Just a hunch that this one can and will be saved. Too many plusses. Great location, easy access, and even excluding Lake George plenty of population around. Its biggest downfall is elevation but that is also a plus as it sits just about right on the banks of the Hudson River which is a great unlimited water resource for snowmaking. Don't know what the current managements problems are but don't see it being abandoned.

Alex

Lake Hopatcong, NJ

 

[thetrailboss]

Just a hunch that this one can and will be saved. Too many plusses. Great location, easy access, and even excluding Lake George plenty of population around. Its biggest downfall is elevation but that is also a plus as it sits just about right on the banks of the Hudson River which is a great unlimited water resource for snowmaking. Don't know what the current managements problems are but don't see it being abandoned.

Alex

Lake Hopatcong, NJ

It sounds like with the right management and some capital for new lifts and snowmaking they should be good. The place has a great location for sure. It's probably the right size that improvements won't be (too) expensive...relatively speaking. Sounds like they have to do some serious PR though to get people interested in coming back.

 

[4aprice]

Has anyone heard anything new here? They still have their web site up and facebook page and apparently have had some activities going on this summer. Maybe I'll find out more when I go to Lake George next week.

Alex

Lake Hopatcong, NJ

 

[thetrailboss]

There was a very nice article in POWDER Magazine about this:

http://www.powdermag.com/stories/morpheme-without-this-mountain/

But nothing new as to what is happening that I know of.

 

[thetrailboss]

West will reopen:

http://www.saminfo.com/news/west-mountain-gets-new-operator-big-plans

 

[ScottySkis]

West will reopen:

http://www.saminfo.com/news/west-mountain-gets-new-operator-big-plans

Nice now I have go this winter.

 

[4aprice]

She sure looked nice from the Northway this weekend. I thought this one would be back as I said before. Lots of plusses and plenty of population around to support it. With the good winter predictions I've seen, I believe I will get there this winter.

Alex

Lake Hopatcong, NJ