Gore Improvements Summer 2015

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So to stay somewhat on topic, what does everyone think the chance is of the early season lift being the AE2 instead of the gondola this year.  In my snowmaking plans, here's the order of lifts opening.

Adirondack Express
Gondola/Topridge/Sunway
Straightbrook
North/Dark Side
Burnt Ridge
Ski Bowl

Why?  Here are the reasons I put the AE2 as opening first.

1.  You only have one lift open at first, so would you rather ski on and off the lift each time, or take your skis off and put them back on to ride the gondola?
2.  Foxlair and Ruby Run are equally lame trails that are nothing but superhighways to get from Bear Mountain to the front side.  They also take a ton of snow to cover.  Instead of skiing those things, you get Showcase.
3.  Wild Air is directly under the gondola.  Once that lift is open for the year, blowing snow on that trail isn't easy, for the reason that cleaning ice off gondola cabins is time consuming and sucks.  Part of my plan is to take the gondola cabins off the line each night to allow for unrestricted snowmaking on Wild Air, and to allow staff to clean them out better after each day.  With this plan, Wild Air would be blown before the gondola opened for the season.  This would mean that the snowmaking crew wouldn't even need to worry about getting ice on the lift.  When it was time to open the gondola, a crew would go out the day before and knock all the ice off the towers and cable.

Also some other things I didn't mention about how I'd handle early season terrain expansion.

1.  With the exception of the ADK Express, no lift opens before Black Friday.
2.  Weather permitting, daily operations start the Friday before Thanksgiving.  Weekend operations can take place any time before that as long as snow can be made.
3.  When a new lift opens, there must be at least two full complete runs off of that lift, plus any connecting trails to the rest of the mountain.  For example, when opening Burnt Ridge, Echo and Sagamore would be the two runs.  Cedars, Hedges, and the connections between Echo and Twister would also need to open.  My proposed trails of Boreas (between Sagamore and Pipeline/Eagle's Nest) and Cirque (between Echo and Sagamore) would open later.  The Ski Bowl is a bit more complex.  Peaceful Valley and 46er would be the two full runs.  Peace Pipe, Pipeline Traverse, Eagle's Nest, plus my proposed connector from Burnt Ridge would also need to open.  It has lots of connecting trails, so lots of things need to open at once.  Hudson, Oak Ridge, and Moxham would open later.

I want my beer in 5 years.

New trail map is finally out there, nice change.

http://www.goremountain.com/files/public/PRI-0703_GORE_MapInsert.pdf

Nice map, still "MacIntrye" glades, not that it matters

I noticed that Moxham got snowmaking as well.  Now I'm just waiting for them to finally make Burnt Ridge into a real section and not just one trail (Sagamore) and some seldom open, low elevation glades (I'll explain why I didn't mention Echo as a trail).  With them closing Echo more and more for racing, Sagamore will only get more and more crowded than it already is.  It used to be that Burnt Ridge was my favorite section at Gore.  Last time I skied there, Sagamore was super crowded and sucked, getting skied off to bare ice by 11am.  Echo had massive snowmaking whales that weren't groomed out and sucked even more.  Meanwhile, Twister off the AE2 skied great all day and wasn't very crowded.

I know Harvey and some others will argue that Burnt Ridge is "unique to NY" with all its glades.  However, when it creates a poor skiing experience in the form of two ridiculously overcrowded trails, and one even more ridiculously overcrowded trail when the racers take Echo, there needs to be change.  It doesn't have to mean that all the glades are destroyed either.  A connection to the Ski Bowl plus two additional trails are what that lift has the capacity to serve.  It needs to serve more of a purpose than going between the Ski Bowl and main mountain, which is what it is becoming more and more like every year.  Just watch each year how more money is put into the botched ski bowl expansion and the front side each year, and the mountain in the middle (BR) gets nothing, ever.

I think Sno makes a valuable point here. It would be good to look at the data on every year since BR has been created. How many days a year or weekends and holiday periods is most of the terrain open on that area. Add up the $ to maintain and run the pod and see if it makes sense to have it the way it is. I bet on average snow years it's not very reliable or viable but I wouldn't know for sure. If it's a fairly new hsq and it mostly just sits there or only serves one or two ski runs most of the time I kind of think that it was poorly planned from a ski area management and planning perspective. It would be fun to look at all of that data and come up with a reasonable answer.

It looks like a large area there on BR with a lot of room for a couple more top to bottom ski runs that could have snowmaking and still have enough room to support equal or even more gladed acreage.

If I lived there and skied there regularly I would probably be on the side of keep it natural and rugged but if I were part of the ski area management with a goal of making it one of the most successful ski areas on the east coast I would want to make better use of the BR area and create better connectivity between all areas of the mountain and the town of NC. the mountain, it's terrain, and close proximity to the tri-state region seem to be a possible gold mine imo. Add in the fact that the ski area actually drops off into a real town, a town that could really benefit from these developments if done properly and is located in an area that I have been led to believe is economically depressed it all seems like a no brainer imo.

I don't really care for Vail but I have to admit, this is a case where I think if Vail could own Gore it would be a good thing for that area. I often think the same about our hill here but we got a new guy and so far things are on the up and up.

There is absolutely massive acreage on BR.  There are currently 3 trails originating from the top of that lift which are Echo, Sagamore, and Hedges.  I don't count Hedges as a Burnt Ridge trail because no one in their right mind would go down and around through the Pipeline Traverse to lap it.  They'd use it to get to the North Side and Saddle Lodge, or anything on the front side if Echo was closed for racing.

I say that Burnt Ridge could support 3 additional trails, easily.  One would be a Ski Bowl connector trail, which I'd call Eagle's Nest.  It would be a full run starting with a winding trail off of the top of BR that would intersect with Pipeline just above first intersection that allows you to go either toward Burnt Ridge (Eagle's Nest) or the Ski Bowl (Pipeline Traverse later becoming Peaceful Valley).  That portion of Eagle's Nest would be widened and regraded into a green and it would continue down to the BRQ as it does now.  The Pipeline Traverse and all Ski Bowl trails would remain unchanged, except Pipeline being re-rated green because it is so flat.  Another trail would be in the area of the Cirque Glades, but not necessarily clear-cutting the entire glade.  It would be rated blue.  The last one would be a clearcut of Boreas Glades named Boreas.  It would also be rated blue.  Even with these trails, there could still be the potential for even more tree skiing than there is now, since there would be more possible entrances and exits.  Now being within the mileage limit might be a problem, but they could probably find a way to fudge the numbers to come in under 40.

Wow that is a SWEET map. So clear.

FWIW I'm not saying my ideas about BR or Gore will maximize profit.  You do that by maximizing skier visits.  Build as many trails as the law allows and put as many people on them as possible, and keep costs down.

Not my thing, but best for the bottom line.

Shout out to Coach on the Vail idea:

http://nyskiblog.com/vail-resorts-buys-orda-1-2b/

And thanks to Johnny for turning the page.

HAHA! Well played coach, well played.

In all seriousness though, it would be huge for New York if that could happen. Vail could throw enough $ at the state to budge on the milage limits. Heck, they could probably relocate the access road to Gore and start it right at NCSB. Put in a base area/lodge at BR, a small village at NCSB, and a connecting gondola from the town of NC, to the NCSB, up to the trail junctions and back down to the BR base area. Put your slopeside lodging all up along the access road to keep it low and blended into the hill side instead of up along the NCSB all the way to the summit like has been planned. Add in a few trails to BR and other areas that make sense and then after that continue to build out the gladed options. Maybe put the learning area and parks right out of town too. Get a lot of the traffic to stay in town and at the NCSB village area. It looks like there is an area up to the traversing trail junctions to put it there. This way the majority of NCSB can keep it's character of the main chair. Night skiing there would be cool too.

World class park skiing and weekend programs for the rich kids from tristate family's, weekend music, contests, and other festivals would would be beneficial. this would also help sell real estate and put money into the pockets of locals. My vision though would be planning to create a successful ski operation but also do it in a way that preserves the character of the mountain and area. I hate the real estate model of a place like Telluride or Okemo. Seeing giant homes lining ski trails half way up mountain sides ruins the whole thing imo.

See Sno, I'm a total dork when it comes to imaginary ski area planning. If I could do it all over again I think I would have tried to balance an education that could put me in that position and being a ski bum at the same time. Oh well, if I only knew then what I know now! Or.....maybe I'll just become a nurse and have four days off a week to play and travel around the four corners in my pimped out van! Yea, I'm not crying.

Having a ski town where u could park your car on Friday night and not see it again until Sunday night would be the bomb. Apre ski without driving is hard to find. It's nice to dream.  Sno become a fireman. Work 24 hrs then have 3 days off to play.  Retire at 45. I think the town of vail has a paid fire department.  

sig wrote

Having a ski town where u could park your car on Friday night and not see it again until Sunday night would be the bomb. Apre ski without driving is hard to find. It's nice to dream.  

It could have happened if the state had left rt28 where it was, instead or re-routing it to avoid downtown North Creek.  The town is downhill from the lifts at Snow Bowl, so theoretically you could have skied all the way to town, and get back to the mountain on a long flat lift.  That would have been sweet.    

MM  

I was thinking of a gondola sort of like Tellurides that doubles as a ski lift and town transportation. Like was just mentioned, park your car for the weekend or holiday and just fade away into safety bubble vacation/mountain town land.

I have to confess,  have never been to north creek. I have been skiing gore for 40 years driving north from Albany. No draw to drive past gore.  

That statement right there would be my mission to change. I bet you aren't alone in thinking like that.

The place has the potential I believe and I haven't even ever skied there!

That's the problem.  Nobody goes there because you don't have to drive through town to get to the mountain.

I have actually made a complete Google Earth trail map of Gore where I show my exact locations for my new trails.  Here are some screenshots of them.

First, Burnt Ridge fully developed.  Cirque is the trail between Echo and Sagamore and Boreas is between Sagamore and the Ski Bowl.  The new Eagle's Nest (Ski Bowl connector trail) is not visible in this picture.



Next are views of Cirque, my proposed trail between Echo and Sagamore.  This would be rated blue, but definitely a harder blue.  I'd say it gets a width wider than Quicksilver, but narrower than Echo.







Note the runout in this picture (Blue) being steeper than Cedars (Green).



After that will be views of Boreas.  This would be a wide open, relatively straight cruiser.  It would probably ski similarly to Showcase, so great for some high speed cruising.








And now Eagle's Nest, the new Ski Bowl connector.  This would be an upper rated green.  It would be about the width of Sunway.  It would be designed to be of similar difficulty to Sunway.  A fun, but easy cruiser for more advanced skiers, but possible for almost all skiers to make it down safely.









And an overview of the trail



And last but not least, a new trail for Topridge.  This would be a narrow twisty expert trail, but equipped with snowmaking, unlike some similar trails at other mountains.  It would contrast nicely with the wide open Topridge Runs that currently exist.

Cool. It's pretty on par with my ideas Sno. You could remove most of the pipeline trail since you created that new connection. How do you put those lines on google earth? Can I do that with my mac? If I can figure it out I'll totally play.

One thought tho, you can't force a designation. I think the mountain has the final say on what that's going to be. Your black trail off that upper mountain pod might be more like a blue but imo that's not a big deal, in fact it might be a good thing.

I used the path function on Google Earth.  I did this on a pc.  I haven't figured out how to do it on my android phone yet.

The way it works is that you plot points and it basically connects the dots to form the path.  For the lifts, I just put one point at the top and one at the bottom to get a straight line.

The new Topridge trail would be a black because it would be very narrow and minimally graded.  There would be grooming, although the trail would be just one groomer width wide.  Snowmaking would still be a must.

The Pipeline Traverse would not be removed because there is still value to being able to access the Ski Bowl directly from the upper mountain.  You also can't do a full top to bottom run without Pipeline.  Some people don't mind having to skate, so why get rid of it?

You using any dynamite?

You can disconnect Pipeline but you don't get the ten miles back.

Somewhere there is an artists rendering of the gondola from downtown North Creek, it's maybe 15 years old by now. Snowballs could probably find it.

Not on the new Topridge trail.  Definitely on Eagle's Nest and Cirque.  Possibly on Boreas.