New Reality

http://unofficialnetworks.com/2017/08/24/alyeska-pushes-back-opening/

Sorry, I don't click on your links

Alaska hasn't really had the best snow totals for the last couple of years.

Article does make a good point. If most of the skiers in the early and late season are hardcore locals who use season passes, what financial incentive is there to open early and close late?

The locals will get pissed, obviously, but they're stuck there, so they'll buy a season pass next year anyway regardless. Definitely sucks for them, but it might be a good business decision on the part of the mountain.

The question is, if you make sure that your mountain opens early and closes late, do more people move to your area and become locals? Do locals move out if you open late and close early? I don't know the answer to that. Is the Killington region growing faster than other mountains in the east? Is the A-Basin region growing faster than other ski towns in Colorado? Jackson Hole always closes early because of their Forest Service Permit, but they seem to be doing pretty well.

As long as WF continues to allow us to skin, I'd prefer they have a later opening. Pile up that man made and offer more coverage on opening day.  

I also thought it would be ten more years till we experienced these realities....  

Alyeska's base is right at sea level so it's not that surprising. In 20 years the tram might just be a lift to access the ski area that only opens from midway up.

Climate zones are moving out here. The forests are burning and new, lower elevation ecosystems are replacing the old, higher ones. The last 3 years we have had javalina's move up onto the Mogollon Rim and I've seen them up to 8500k in elevation. Glaciers are disappearing and we are even starting to see snow packs beginning to take on completely different characteristics. The San Juans in southern Colorado had a maritime pack this past season, one of the changes that I've been selfishly a little excited about to be honest. I think that's going to become a more regular thing for thaose mountains which will open up a lot of new and bold skiing.

Anyways, shit is getting weird.

MC2 5678F589 wrote

Sorry, I don't click on your links
 

HAHAHAHAHH ---- yea, Scotty, you dirty bird!!!

It really is a new reality. Like MC states I guess I can't blame them for shifting gears if it helps them turn a profit. Nobody's in this game to lose money, but sometimes you need to spend a little to make a little.

I know I'm shifting gears when it comes to my winter activities this year. I'm buying a brand new sled, going to do some more small game hunting, and get into ice fishing a little more. I'll still get me days in but I'll ski in conditions I want to ski in. I didn't get a pass this year because I'm done torturing myself skiing on conditions I don't like. Bring on the snow! BRAAAAP!!!

Kinda generalizing but for awhile I felt at some point in my lifetime snow would not existbelow 6000 feet....  

Selfishly, the mtn bike season is longer in the Adirondacks over the last decade.  So winters out west is my plan in less than a decade....  

ScottyJack wrote

So winters out west is my plan in less than a decade....

Solid plan. Thinking I might do the same.

ScottyJack wrote

As long as WF continues to allow us to skin, I'd prefer they have a later opening. Pile up that man made and offer more coverage on opening day.

What exactly do we have to gain by Whiteface opening later?  I think their early season product is pretty good compared to many other mountains and they seemed to get plenty of people on the hill on weekends.  With snowmaking upgrades coming for 17-18, it's only going to get even better.

snoloco wrote

What exactly do we have to gain

It clearly hinges on the definition of "we."

snoloco wrote

What exactly do we have to gain by Whiteface opening later?  I think their early season product is pretty good compared to many other mountains and they seemed to get plenty of people on the hill on weekends.  With snowmaking upgrades coming for 17-18, it's only going to get even better.

I agree with Sno.  It seems that going from not open to even 40 or 50% operation is kind of weird, like not really credible.  I think you want to build some excitement, so when an area is open in November, it gets people thinking about skiing.  Y'know, like "hey, Bill, XXX is open" as Bill responds: "already?"

My experience in Washington with Mission Ridge has been interesting.  It feels like we are going in the opposite direction of Alyeska.  Our base elevation is 4650 ft.  In this climate zone, 4650 is the lower end of the elevation needed to develop persistent snow pack.  From a snow-pack perspective, the zone is described as "inter-mountain" as opposed to "maritime."  Our snow feels more like Colorado or Utah, as opposed to the Sierra.  That said, our yearly totals are about 40% of what falls just 60 miles West of here (240in vs 500in).  In the past 2 seasons we have exceeded our historical averages by greater than 25%.  Needless to say, things have been quite erratic over the past couple of decades.  Oddly enough, we have seen more good years than bad.  That said, we are the only mountain in WA with a T2B snow making system.  By Eastern standards, it's a micro-dwarf system that is capable of creating WA states only White Ribbon of Death.  Under current management, the mountain has been committed to opening "as early as possible."   Typically the first to open in WA, from mid November to mid December, we get a fair amount of day trippers from across the state looking to ride the WROD.  Nothing like back East... people are not as stoked over here to ride early season snow.  There are lots of snow-snobs that don't even consider riding the lifts until late December or January.  Don't get me wrong... with my time out here, I have become a total snow-snob, but I still love getting out on the mountain as early as possible.  

As far as I can tell, there are no operation schedule changes at Mission in the near future.  We had lift service until Apr 30th last season... the latest closing in 50 years.  Lets hope we see more of the same in the future.  I'm kind of hoping we're in one of those pockets that benefits from the extremes that come about due to climate change.

I assume Alyeska is relatively isolated and it really is only locals who are basically a captive audience before Christmas.

Other ski areas are located in areas where there is competition and if one decides not to open till Christmas and all their competitors are open by Thanksgiving, the one that opens later will lose out on a lot of business as more people will buy passes at the one that's open earlier.

And Harvey, by "we", I mean regular Whiteface customers.

snoloco wrote

What exactly do we have to gain by Whiteface opening later?

We, all of us, skiers and Mountain alike, have better, more consistent and reliable mid-winter conditions to gain.  Yes, that would come at the expense of some die-hards and locals making November turns, and any buzz/excitement level that may create.

Snowmaking budgets are generally a fixed thing, I believe.  When it's gone, it's gone.  Pushing for a Thanksgiving opening likely consumes a significant portion of that budget, much of that investment destined to melt before the season starts in earnest.  It's quite possible they are throwing away a significant portion of the budget to 'create buzz', allow local pass holders to get an early start, and hopefully sell some Thanksgiving week tickets and grab a couple weekends of marginal extra revenue.  But is that enough to justify opening early?  Not sure, and it's easy for me to question as I generally can't get out until mid/late December anyway.

IMHO, I don't think the 'buzz' from an early opening really sells any more in season tickets.  The kind of people who would get excitement from the buzz are the kind of people who are going to ski in season anyway.  Yes, it would suck for locals and those people who do want to make Turkey Day turns.

Back to that benefit.  Especially with snowmaking capacity improvements coming, wouldn't it be good to have more budget to spend when snowmaking conditions are more favorable, and the snow that gets made is more likely to actually stick around?  Furthermore, especially given the changing climate we now live in, wouldn't it be better to be able to push harder recovery after unfavorable freeze/thaw cycles?  If your sliding experience in season could be improved significantly with better conditions, wouldn't that be worth losing a couple of early season days of sliding on the WROD, days that come at an operating loss for the hill?

The risk in not pushing the shoulder season is season pass sales, which we know are very important.  Yes, the locals will be buying regardless.  However, there may be potential pass holders who could be pushed off the fence in the wrong direction should the seasons become shorter.

If they waited until optimal weather to make snow they would not turn the guns on till January.  History tells us we are going to get wash outs almost every year.   Then you have the time frame it takes to make any considerable amount of snow in relation to an entire mountain.  They need to start as early as they do just to get the entire mountain open by the end of January.  One way to solve it is to build up the system so they could cover the entire mountain In three weeks.  Another thought would be to blow snow where there is a colder environment, Like above 3k feet.  It would be a good experiment if they started as early as possible and concentrated entirely on the upper mountain with out access to skiing for the public, then as the colder weather comes further down the mountain hit the lower elevation.  You would probably have a later opening because of access but will also have a lot more terrain available for the Christmas holiday, which they need, for repeat business.   The hikers would be ok they could skin up to the summit.  The mountain may not be able to open at thanksgiving but when they did open there would be plenty of terrain for everyone.

I think it could be a good idea to only blow above mid for the first 2-3 weeks and cover the bottom later, using the gondola to download.  They'd still have more vertical than most other ski areas and everyone would be able to ski on better snow on the upper mountain.  One problem I ran into last December is that the snow was very good mid winter conditions at the top, but mediocre WROD at the bottom, but everyone had to ski the full run due to the Little Whiteface lift not being open.

Yeah, I get all that, you do need to start as early as is practically possible.  Thaws don't just come in January anymore.  It takes a long time to cover the mountain.  However, blowing mid November snow that they know will be back in the Ausable come December, just so that they can lose money with Thanksgiving operations,  may not be the best use of resources.  I like your ideas though.....stop worrying about how early they open, and worry about the best way to efficiently open the most terrain, and keep it open.  Start blowing up high once the right forecast hits, cover and stockpile with snow that won't melt out in short order, then move your way down the hill as more consistent temps permit.  Sure, start blowing the summit at Thanksgiving and then open with really good conditions mid December, not having washed significant snowmaking budget into the river just to open a WROD for Turkey Day.  I'm all for it!!

tjf1967 wrote

One way to solve it is to build up the system so they could cover the entire mountain In three weeks.  

Another thought would be to blow snow where there is a colder environment, Like above 3k feet.  

It would be a good experiment if they started as early as possible and concentrated entirely on the upper mountain with out access to skiing for the public, then as the colder weather comes further down the mountain hit the lower elevation..

I think these are very good ideas.

Me too!