VAIL SUCKS

[1dog]

Free cash flow and enterprise value ( since EV doesn't include cash) - those are a but less 'malleable'. Its probably too small in scale to warrant a DOJ monopoly query, but the free market - given time - takes care of a lot. $240 lift tickets, $1500 lessons, you can. see the 'let 'em eat cake' attitude rising. as for investing, well, I seem to always gravitate to Samuel Clemens : 'Its easier to fool people than convince them that they have been fooled.'

 

[ss20]

It also looks like the technology has matured and perhaps resorts just don't see the value in upgrading. New Poma fixed grips look exactly the same as 40 year old Poma's. A few detachables have those chaine things but how many are so dated a customer would notice an upgrade. Only one for me is Sugarbush's North Ridge, and maybe a few slower ones from the 1990's. I here if you maintain them well, they will last forever and can think of a few lifts that rarely break down but are really old. So perhaps they no longer view new lifts as nessisarily an upgrade but sometime just an extremely expensive maintence project.

Not quite true. There's still slow incremental change in new designs that improve efficiency, safety, comfort, etc when it comes to detachable chairlifts. Also a fixed grip will last forever if maintained. With a detachable chairlift this simply is not the case. A detachable lift is a massive Rube Goldberg machine... parts wear/fatigue and after a certain age the lift becomes uneconomical to maintain.

 

[machski]

Not quite true. There's still slow incremental change in new designs that improve efficiency, safety, comfort, etc when it comes to detachable chairlifts. Also a fixed grip will last forever if maintained. With a detachable chairlift this simply is not the case. A detachable lift is a massive Rube Goldberg machine... parts wear/fatigue and after a certain age the lift becomes uneconomical to maintain.

True, although as we are seeing with Dopp, they can reuse most of the steel and overhaul the rest of the machine at a much lower cost than a totally new machine. With the cost of a totally new lift so high, I have a feeling we will see more of this in the industry where it makes sense.

 

[BenedictGomez]

I could see Vail slowly firesaling a few of these properties at a time back into the hands of impassioned locals to free up small amounts of short term operating cash as they restructure some debt and remove the need for infrastructure planning outside the core resorts.

This is going to happen.

When it does they'll call these mountains "non-core assets" as they get rid of them, rather than a heretofore key part of driving EPIC pass sales.

 

[doublediamond]

And that separates Dopp from Poma. Dopp gladly supports old models including those of manufacturers there bought out and they do these refurbishments even if it's just throwing a bone to Boyne. Poma won't even support 25 year old lifts.

Between the Needle Eyes fiasco, refusal to propose an FIS-suitable profile for Superstar 6, and their track record of their inability to finish lifts on time, Poma lost a large customer with a lot of lift replacements in the near future.

Poma is taking the Boeing/Vail approach of short term gains is better than long term success.

 

[thetrailboss]

Re: Doppelmayr doing refurbishments. I only know of them doing it for 3 lifts for Boyne. Am I missing something? It’s not a widely used option. Yet.

 

[doublediamond]

They might be throwing Boyne a bone with all their D-Line purchases. Regardless they are still supporting older lifts than Poma.

 

[machski]

They might be throwing Boyne a bone with all their D-Line purchases. Regardless they are still supporting older lifts than Poma.

I believe they definitely are tossing Boyne a Bone with the refurb of the Six Shooter replacing Timberline at SL. I do not see Dopp doing refurbs on old Garaventa CTEC HSC's normally. This one off makes some sense since SL's two older HSQ's are already the same machines. I can't see them doing that too often on that tech. Now their pure Dopp tech, I can see that. But a resort isn't going to lose a season without a primary lift while it's guts are completely rebuilt. So it will have to be more along the lines of how Boyne has done it. Pull a lift and upgrade that one and reuse somewhere else the next season or 2.

 

[urungus]

Town Lift at stake as landowners sue Vail Resorts over contract breach - Park Record

A skier’s slip and fall in the public bathroom at the base of Town Lift threatens to shut down the chairlift out of Old Town. Pat Sweeney, along with brothers Ed and Michael, on Friday filed a lawsuit in Third District Court claiming Vail Resorts broke a lease dating back to 1981 granting Park...

www.parkrecord.com

 

[doublediamond]

Vail Resorts dum dum dum dum dum dum dum dum dum.

 

[thetrailboss]

Town Lift at stake as landowners sue Vail Resorts over contract breach - Park Record

A skier’s slip and fall in the public bathroom at the base of Town Lift threatens to shut down the chairlift out of Old Town. Pat Sweeney, along with brothers Ed and Michael, on Friday filed a lawsuit in Third District Court claiming Vail Resorts broke a lease dating back to 1981 granting Park...

www.parkrecord.com

I read that. The long and short of it is that there is a dispute over who should defend who. Especially if the landowner is alleged to have been negligent. I’m sure it will get worked out.

 

[BenedictGomez]

I read that. The long and short of it is that there is a dispute over who should defend who. Especially if the landowner is alleged to have been negligent. I’m sure it will get worked out.

That lease is really old, and I'm sure sucks compared to what you could get today on the open market. In that light, isn't it possible this Sweeney guy is using Vail's typical idiotic thriftiness as an excuse to get out from it & sell to the highest bidder?

 

[doublediamond]

Vail is claming self-insuracnce is equivalent to the lease requirement of having an insurer who is approved with approved terms by the landowner.

Vail won’t win this case.

 

[AdironRider]

This is two dudes trying to shakedown Vail, on shaky ground ethically at best IMO.

It will be interesting to see how this plays out. Park City has been pretty adversarial to Vail (see parking lot permit denial etc), but if this results in a loss of the town lift, I'm not quite sure the public is going to be ok with two rich guys fucking that up for a few extra bucks. Notably, that they are trying to take advantage of some injured person's misery to renegotiate a lease doesn't help.

 

[thetrailboss]

This is two dudes trying to shakedown Vail, on shaky ground ethically at best IMO.

It will be interesting to see how this plays out. Park City has been pretty adversarial to Vail (see parking lot permit denial etc), but if this results in a loss of the town lift, I'm not quite sure the public is going to be ok with two rich guys fucking that up for a few extra bucks. Notably, that they are trying to take advantage of some injured person's misery to renegotiate a lease doesn't help.

Frankly, I thought that the article was more of a sensational/attack piece against Vail and that the landowners are using anti-Vail sentiment to push their grievance against Vail. "Oh no, they are going to shut down the Town Chairlift." Give me a fucking break. A women slipped and fell in the bathroom, she sued Vail as the tenant AND the landowner, and the two parties are trying to figure out who should pay for the defense of who due to their indemnity agreements. Such questions routinely come up all the time.

 

[jimmywilson69]

yeah I agree...

 

[deadheadskier]

The day someone gets food poisoning at a Vail property, then they'll really see some legal peril.

 

[2Planker]

The day someone gets food poisoning at a Vail property, then they'll really see some legal peril.

Like what happened at SR 15+ years ago, from Sliders...
That was UGLY the next day.