Vail Resorts is buying Peak Resorts.

[EPB]

The reality is that most ski areas, at best, reach the capacity of their infrastructure *maybe* 15-25 days a year. The other 340-350 days a year, there's room to expand the potential utilization of the facilities. Now granted on so many of those days (like say random Tuesday's in May) that's not going to happen, however during the ski season, there certainly is potential to expand the customer utilization of the existing facilities most days. The business owner side of me completely gets that concept of trying to expand utilization of existing facilities. The totally self centered ski consumer side of me wishes that on some days, especially where I usually ski and with having seen an increase in utilization of the facilities the last few years, that Rob Katz's plan for Vail Resorts properties tries and encourage a lateral movement of customer utilization away from my home mountain to other resorts within the stable of Vail Resorts properties.

The struggle in my head between both of those sides of the situation is real! :razz::argue:[emoji38]

It's a tough business in that regard. I'd love to know how much of the typical resort's earnings are generated by skiers that interact primarily with their resort of choice on one of the ~15-25 busiest days of the year.

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[asnowmobiler]

Renovate it up one level!!

 

[catskillman]

Just finished reading the MTN 1Q20 earnings transcript.

You Peaks people new to Vail are going to to get everything short of a retinal scan & be marketed the helloutof over the next year. LOL

Here's a question an analyst asked that could have come straight from Alpinezone:



Short version: There is no crowding!

BS!!! He obviously has not been to Hunter last season or last week Saturday. They say they are big on safety --- we'll see.........

 

[thebigo]

BS!!! He obviously has not been to Hunter last season or last week Saturday. They say they are big on safety --- we'll see.........

One very noticeable change this year at crotched is patrol, they have been much more visible and verbal. Actually stationed at spots where ropes are commonly ducked and yelling at people from a distance to not duck. Also roping woods areas commonly used as cut through to avoid skating. I suspect the injury rates at crotched are comparably high given the operating hours and clientele. Really hoping they dont hassle us later in the season when the very regularly skied off map stuff has snow.

And for those of you hoping for new bathrooms at hunter, work continues on the wildcat basement bathrooms. Sometime in october the stalls, sinks, counter and toilets were replaced. On friday they were dry walling over the exposed plumbing. Previous bathrooms had not been touched in the nearly 40 years I have been skiing the cat.

 

[chuckstah]

I've noticed the same thing at Crotched. Patrol is everywhere. I still ignore the closures as always, but I suspect I'll get a warning at some point. In the past ropes have been a suggestion, just like Wildcat. But I'm betting Vail will really dumb it down and yank passes. That will surely drive me away for next season if it happens. Without the woods and adventure skiing there's only so many hours I can put in there.

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[2Planker]

One very noticeable change this year at crotched is patrol, they have been much more visible and verbal. Actually stationed at spots where ropes are commonly ducked and yelling at people from a distance to not duck. Also roping woods areas commonly used as cut through to avoid skating. I suspect the injury rates at crotched are comparably high given the operating hours and clientele. Really hoping they dont hassle us later in the season when the very regularly skied off map stuff has snow.

And for those of you hoping for new bathrooms at hunter, work continues on the wildcat basement bathrooms. Sometime in october the stalls, sinks, counter and toilets were replaced. On friday they were dry walling over the exposed plumbing. Previous bathrooms had not been touched in the nearly 40 years I have been skiing the cat.

Agreed, I was 12 the first time I went to The Cat, and those bathrooms were what we've had for at least 45 years....

Wifey still prefers downstairs when we BYO lunch. Rarely go up to main level...

 

[mbedle]

I've noticed the same thing at Crotched. Patrol is everywhere. I still ignore the closures as always, but I suspect I'll get a warning at some point. In the past ropes have been a suggestion, just like Wildcat. But I'm betting Vail will really dumb it down and yank passes. That will surely drive me away for next season if it happens. Without the woods and adventure skiing there's only so many hours I can put in there.

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Expect some pulled passes, just had a friend lose his for a month at Stowe.

 

[snoseek]

They keep a board at heavenly with the breakdown for lost and suspended passes as a deterrent. The yellow jackets are coming I would imagine.

 

[kingslug]

At Stowe there is a sign warning this..

 

[thebigo]

I've noticed the same thing at Crotched. Patrol is everywhere. I still ignore the closures as always, but I suspect I'll get a warning at some point. In the past ropes have been a suggestion, just like Wildcat. But I'm betting Vail will really dumb it down and yank passes. That will surely drive me away for next season if it happens. Without the woods and adventure skiing there's only so many hours I can put in there.

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Daughter and I were yelled at three times on opening weekend by patrol, never even spoke to patrol in the past. The seasonal programs at small local areas are a huge time commitment for parents, only thing that gets me through the shitty days is looking forward to the trees being open. Will be tough to commit to another season if they start hassling people for skiing anything without a three foot manmade base.

Have not noticed any change in patrol at wildcat.

 

[Edd]

Daughter and I were yelled at three times on opening weekend by patrol, never even spoke to patrol in the past.

What were they yelling at you for?

 

[andrec10]

What were they yelling at you for?

Nobody ever does anything wrong....Right.

 

[thebigo]

What were they yelling at you for?

Not claiming we did not ski closed terrain but the same shit never drew the attention of patrol in the past.

Opening night milky way was roped for all but about ten feet, I thought they were trying to control traffic flow but apparently it was closed. Daughter skied through the opening first, I followed her and was chased down by patrol.

Daughter ducked onto ungroomed plutos below the cross over to the triple to play in the powder under the lift, again chased down by patrol and lectured about ropes, safety, objects hidden under the snow and the general difficulty of being on ski patrol when people duck ropes.

Third we had been cutting from lower plutos across the triple to the lodge all weekend. Sunday afternoon near the end of the day they decided to rope from the triple to the woods on the skiers right. There were a number of us, including small children, attempting to cut through that then had to traverse back to the far side of plutos. A couple people ducked the rope to cut about 10 yards back to the open side of lower pluto, patrol lost it and started hollering at the remaining people.

First two I chalked up to opening night: snow was falling on top of the couple of feet that fell that week and visibility was poor. Third was just odd – they could have easily roped to the riders left of the chair, instead they chose to rope in an area that required people to skate out – uphill; then decided to hassle people attempting to cut back to open terrain on packed powder in a highly visible area.

 

[Edd]

Have not noticed any change in patrol at wildcat.

I rarely even see patrol at the Cat.

 

[mbedle]

I rarely even see patrol at the Cat.

Thats going to change next season...

 

[Smellytele]

Any idea what their skinning policy is (or might be going forward) at crotched?


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[drjeff]

Any idea what their skinning policy is (or might be going forward) at crotched?


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Midway down this page is your official answers to their uphill policies this year

https://www.crotchedmtn.com/mountain-safety/

 

[jimmywilson69]

Dr Jeff have you seen a more "aggressive" ski patrol approach at Mt Snow?

 

[Smellytele]

So looks like skinning is free and allowed in daylight when they are open. Also no charge. Great thanks


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[drjeff]

Dr Jeff have you seen a more "aggressive" ski patrol approach at Mt Snow?

Honestly haven't noticed much of a difference in what the ambassadors and patrolers are doing.

What I have noticed, is that more folks (not a huge amount, but sure feels like more folks) are pushing the boundaries on what they're doing on the hill (speed, rope ducking, being courteous, respecting the posted rules, etc) and I think that that may be more of what's going on verses a complete change in the enforcement policy