VAIL SUCKS

[RH29]

Just realized that unless I'm missing something, the interactive trail maps on Vail's app have a button to only display open lifts...but not one for only open trails. Great, I can see that a lift serving the entire mountain is running with no clue about terrain unless I scroll through the trail report.

 

[crystalmountainskier]

They also got rid of lift line wait times?

 

[thetrailboss]

Park City court decision could open ski resorts’ secret formula for accommodating crowds

A Utah court's decision could expose the complicated and secret "comfortable carrying capacity" formulas ski resorts use to manage crowds

coloradosun.com

 

[joshua segal]

Joshua - serious question, can you point to where opening day is mentioned on the crotched website? I see countless attempts to sell epic passes but zero reference to the fact that the mountain is opening in a few days?

I don't defend the web pages on any of the Vail areas. As far as I know, the web pages are controlled by Broomfield.

The only social media I follow is FB and opening is announced there. See: https://www.facebook.com/CrotchedMountain. I suspect that there are similar postings on other social media platforms. These are locally controlled.

BTW: Sunapee is opening T2B on Thursday, Nov. 30.

 

[4aprice]

When it comes to late season skiing, who is the last to close in New Hampshire? The 2 mountains with the highest ski elevations are of course Cannon and Wildcat. Cannon appears to have a great set up with the Tram and Profile lifts and a seeming nice pod of trails but the state is not going to keep it open. Wildcat had a great setup as well but took the upper double out around the time they took out the gondola IIRC. Back in 2019 I hit the last weekend at Loon (around the middle of April) there was plenty of snow but they were shutting for the season anyways. Maybe Sunday River becomes best late season option for eastern NH skiers.

 

[oldfartrider]

You might find some info here: https://www.newenglandskihistory.com/NewHampshire/
You’d have to look at the bottom of the page for each resort where they list closing dates.

 

[doublediamond]

Hidden in their opening day message, Attitash admits that the “new Mountaineer Lift is still on track to open in late December during vacation week.”

No, Vail, that’s not what you said a month ago, nor is what you said earlier in the summer.

Lift completion date is slipping fast!

 

[drjeff]

Hidden in their opening day message, Attitash admits that the “new Mountaineer Lift is still on track to open in late December during vacation week.”

No, Vail, that’s not what you said a month ago, nor is what you said earlier in the summer.

Lift completion date is slipping fast!

Pretty sure they said all along (or atleast since late Summer) that the target opening date for Mountainer was going to be Christmas week.

 

[thetrailboss]

Hidden in their opening day message, Attitash admits that the “new Mountaineer Lift is still on track to open in late December during vacation week.”

No, Vail, that’s not what you said a month ago, nor is what you said earlier in the summer.

Lift completion date is slipping fast!

As I said, Poma seems to really be having issues completing installs in a timely fashion. Alta's 6-Pack last year was not done until January 21st. That required Alta to use off-duty ski instructors and patrollers to do the work. BEast is also behind schedule. Like Alta, Vail had to fly out its own labor to do a lot of the work and only did so a couple weeks ago. I would think that Poma would want to get things done and make customers happy because thy do not have the same amount of marketshare as their competitor Doppelmayr. BTW Doppelmayr's projects at Brighton, Solitude, and Sunday River are all near completion if not done.

 

[cdskier]

As I said, Poma seems to really be having issues completing installs in a timely fashion. Alta's 6-Pack last year was not done until January 21st. That required Alta to use off-duty ski instructors and patrollers to do the work. BEast is also behind schedule. Like Alta, Vail had to fly out its own labor to do a lot of the work and only did so a couple weeks ago. I would think that Poma would want to get things done and make customers happy because thy do not have the same amount of marketshare as their competitor Doppelmayr. BTW Doppelmayr's projects at Brighton, Solitude, and Sunday River are all near completion if not done.

The new quad at Belleayre is up and running already. The new Whiteface chair was being load tested a couple weeks ago so should either be done or just about ready as well (both Dopp projects).

 

[doublediamond]

I’m not watching all their social media vids, but they definitely used the phrase “for vacation week” in multiple captions going back to August. And now it’s changed to “during vacation week”. That’s a big difference especially when Vail is always careful about their phraseology. And I could swear they initially said that it would be open for opening day (before the super wet summer but regardless of the summer, slipping a month in a 6 month construction season is BAD especially when October was relatively dry).

And besides the point, if you can’t build a base to summit lift to open for the second busiest week of the year, why the F is Poma still getting contracts?!?

It seems Poma has massive build/delivery delays. Attitash didn’t get towers and cross-arms until mid-August. Meanwhile Doppelmayr has parts stored on a nearby vacant lot already for the D-Line gondola for Homewood.

 

[zyk]

The new quad at Belleayre is up and running already. The new Whiteface chair was being load tested a couple weeks ago so should either be done or just about ready as well (both Dopp projects).

In this case could it be the difference between nys govt funds and private funds. Nys answers to no one mostly while the corporations answer to stockholders. NYS has gone big. Beyond lifts all the hkd guns are all lined up. Impressive to see at both Whiteface and Belleayre.

 

[thetrailboss]

In this case could it be the difference between nys govt funds and private funds. Nys answers to no one mostly while the corporations answer to stockholders. NYS has gone big. Beyond lifts all the hkd guns are all lined up. Impressive to see at both Whiteface and Belleayre.

That’s not the issue.

 

[drjeff]

I’m not watching all their social media vids, but they definitely used the phrase “for vacation week” in multiple captions going back to August. And now it’s changed to “during vacation week”. That’s a big difference especially when Vail is always careful about their phraseology. And I could swear they initially said that it would be open for opening day (before the super wet summer but regardless of the summer, slipping a month in a 6 month construction season is BAD especially when October was relatively dry).

And besides the point, if you can’t build a base to summit lift to open for the second busiest week of the year, why the F is Poma still getting contracts?!?

It seems Poma has massive build/delivery delays. Attitash didn’t get towers and cross-arms until mid-August. Meanwhile Doppelmayr has parts stored on a nearby vacant lot already for the D-Line gondola for Homewood.

Honestly, I don't think they ever said that they would have the Mountaineer for opening day, as when has Attitash ever had Summit access for opening day? Typically they get mid mountain access via Flying Yankee for opening day, and it seems like right now they're going off of the new last year Progression Quad as they finish up getting the Mountainer out of active construction phase and into the testing phase prior to it's certification, and likely Bear Peak going very soon as well. That's still a bunch of terrain available before the new lift spins

Attitash, currently atleast, just doesn't have the snowmaking firepower to get open from the Summit on day 1, unless they wanted to delay opening day until probably mid December or so. That's just the reality of their current system and it's historical performance, even with full staffing and some good weather windows to make snow.

Also this year, with Christmas falling on a Monday, the reality is that the masses won't hit the sloped until Wednesay the 27th in all likelihood, So if it opens by the 27th, verses say Saturday the 23rd, does the semantics of what has been said of it's timeframe 3 months or so ago really make that big of a deal?

 

[zyk]

That’s not the issue.

Fair enough. So maybe Poma needs to reevaluate strategy or take on less work? Or hire and train more crews? Unhappy customers usually lead to even less market share so either they're ok with this or don't have a good plan to fix it.

 

[thetrailboss]

Fair enough. So maybe Poma needs to reevaluate strategy or take on less work? Or hire and train more crews? Unhappy customers usually lead to even less market share so either they're ok with this or don't have a good plan to fix it.

In terms of the NYS projects, they were all Doppelmayr IIRC. Poma seems to be having issues. I would have thought that appeasing Vail would be a priority. Apparently not.

 

[Edd]

In terms of the NYS projects, they were all Doppelmayr IIRC. Poma seems to be having issues. I would have thought that appeasing Vail would be a priority. Apparently not.

You’d think, right? I’m assuming Vail is the world’s largest ski company. If true, and they can’t deliver on time, that sounds bad, although not atypical with staffing issues generally now.

 

[thetrailboss]

You’d think, right? I’m assuming Vail is the world’s largest ski company. If true, and they can’t deliver on time, that sounds bad, although not atypical with staffing issues generally now.

Exactly! Is Poma THAT dysfunctional? That is what I would like to know. Perhaps they are getting too big too fast.

 

[crystalmountainskier]

In terms of the NYS projects, they were all Doppelmayr IIRC. Poma seems to be having issues. I would have thought that appeasing Vail would be a priority. Apparently not.

2 Doppelmayr, 1 Skytrac/Poma this year.

 

[crystalmountainskier]

We don't know what Vail's agreement with Poma is. Lifts are often contracted with December X completion dates, particularly if the order was placed later in the season. Breck's Poma detach was completed much earlier, probably because it had an earlier contracted delivery date.