WF lifts and wind

I've been staying away but this issue requires someone to bring it up - Aussie to the rescue

Mother nature must really hate WF.  On key holiday weekends the wind seems to blow with the specific purpose to drive loyal WF's skiers crazy.    Twice during xmas week and now MLK.  Can't wait to see what Ma Nature has in mind for us for President's Day.

In case you missed the longest lift line in the history of WF the lift line on Sunday for the Facelift wrapped around its self several times and ran almost all the way back to Boreen.  It was about a 45+ min line.  For some unknown reason the Bear Chair was not running.  If the quad can run Bear should be running.  Is there something wrong with that lift or is its specs such that it has a lower max wind speed than the Facelift?

I walked up to Freeway / I / 7 that was running instead of waiting in the Disney style line at the Facelift.

WF needs to put a long term plan in place to fix this all too common issue.  If the Bear lift is too old then that needs to get replaced.  Freeway / I / 7 also is very old and soon will need replacement.  How about a fixed grip quad with a mid station that would replace them both?  You could put a new lift slighly to the lookers left of Bear on the same lift line as the I chair and have a mid station for the lower level skiers.  WF badly needs this capacity out of the base area for busy times and windy days.  This has become a critical situation and needs to be addressed.

The winds on Sunday were spectacular.   I was on one of the last ten chairs when they shut the mountain run down lift down.  I did not notice a ton of wind on it.  About two towers before unloading a gust came through that blew the chair up sideways.  I have never had that happen before.  I was on the lift with a Russian tourist and all we could do is laugh and howl.   I got off and went over to where you cut over to wilderness to wait for Daberta.  JR was on the lift behind them and it was done.   I was looking up at them laughing cause it was surreal.  They got off and skied over to me.  The chair they were on had no bar and they had death grips on the lift.  Scooted down to the racers chair and the line was half way across tower ten hill.    I had doing crowd control duty at the quad and a giant gust came through. When you could see again I looked behind me and a person in a neon one piece got blown over.  The whole line took notice probably cause I was yelling pointing out.

Ill say this, anyone that was out skiing Sunday was having a good time.  Crazy day to ski.  Did not notice any upset customers.  If they were skiing Sunday they were die hearts.   Snow was awsome sat and Sunday...and Yesterday for that matter.   Fun weekend.

I dont kow whats wrong with the bear chair.  It may be broke cause I would have thought it would be spinning...never thought to ask

ausable skier wrote

 How about a fixed grip quad with a mid station that would replace them both?  You could put a new lift slighly to the lookers left of Bear on the same lift line as the I chair and have a mid station for the lower level skiers.  WF badly needs this capacity out of the base area for busy times and windy days.

Love this. It's a great idea (which is why it probably won't happen).

Gore's only wind related lift closure was the Topridge chair on Sunday (and I wouldn't have wanted to ride it anyway).

I think the only way you could keep WF open when its windy would be a bunch of T-Bars and rope tows. Which would be nice during storms because as we all know the lifts rarely spin during a snowstorm.

I feel your pain ausable skier, I cleaned two feet off my car in Wilmington March 18th two years ago, only lift spinning was Bear. Ended up at Gore, only lower mountain there was open. I think I had more fun bombing around on rt9 that day than skiing. Biggest cock tease of my skiing life.

tjf1967 wrote

I'll say this, anyone that was out skiing Sunday was having a good time.  Crazy day to ski.  Did not notice any upset customers.  If they were skiing Sunday they were die hearts.   Snow was awsome sat and Sunday...and Yesterday for that matter.   Fun weekend.

We skied Sunday and Monday at WF.  Got a late start skiing Sun morning due to driving up from Saratoga, but we toughed out the wind and the lift lines and skied till sometime after 3pm.  TJ hit the nail on the head ^^, it was fun skiing and surprisingly good snow.  As I say in my trip report (click here if you want to read it), you can always count on WF for a bit of adventure with your skiing.  Monday was great – no wind, cold, Skyward was awesome.

As for Sunday’s lift lines, maybe we got lucky with our timing because the longest we waited for the Face Lift or Freeway Lift was maybe 20 minutes.  Fortunately the lines were orderly – kudos to the Mountain Hosts / Ski Patrol for crowd control.

It did seem like the mountain took a pretty big hit from the thaw, but even with the mtn only 50% open we had plenty of good terrain options.  Hopefully the sm crews will give the trail counts a huge boost this week.  My pick for the weekend has to be Skyward, but Essex and Mtn Run were not far behind.

Face Lift line Sunday morning:


Mountain Run on Sunday:


Heading for Skyward, Monday morning:


TJ, your story about the Mtn Run lift on Sunday sounds familiar, did we ride the Face Lift with you on Sun?

I was in orange.  Did you ride with any host patrol?  Proibably not though, I only rode the quad twice.  

Would have been late morning.  3 in our party: me, wife, kid.  You mentioned good snow on Mt Run, not so good on Parkway/Thruway, and that Skyward was great on Sat.  Also about being on the Mtn Run lift earlier that morning.  Don't remember jacket etc, I'm bad about noticing that kind of stuff...

Anywho, it was a good day!

ausable skier wrote

 It was about a 45+ min line.  

As ADK Jeff said, it was 20 minutes at the most. Maybe you took a wrong turn in the corral and got lost.

I was told by others it was 45 mins.  It certainly looked that long - I've never seen it like that before.  I decided the walk up to Freeway / i / 7 was quicker.  Why do WF's lift all have 3 different names / numbers / letters anyway ??  

I think my idea for a future lift upgrade makes too much sense thus it will never happen

ausable skier wrote

Freeway / i / 7 was quicker.  Why do WF's lift all have 3 different names / numbers / letters anyway ??  

Name = for customers on the map
Letter = for patrollers and other employees
number = is from 20 years ago although many locals and oldtimers use them especially for Summit Quad/F/6

sounds like ....skating on the pond was a good choice

I thought you'd just been skiing pow in VT?

Welcome back, Aussie.

Welcome back AS, the Whiteface dialogue has been lagging this season since you when on sabbatical.  

I agree with you that the end is near for Bear and Freeway and have a few comments.  It should be a triple and the ski crossover between the two lifts could have a skier headroom issue (the mid station exit ramp has to be flat for the beginners).  Lastly, if there was one lift that replaced the two, could there be mid-lift loading?

ausable skier wrote

I was told by others it was 45 mins.  It certainly looked that long -

So I posted it on the internet like it was fact - jack!  (got that from Si - Campy!!)

I think your lift idea is not a good one at all.  I think the meager, limited resources should be allocated to cutting the next trail in the lookout pod this summer.  And I think that will happen.

ScottyJack wrote

ausable skier wrote

I was told by others it was 45 mins.  It certainly looked that long -

So I posted it on the internet like it was fact - jack!  (got that from Si - Campy!!)

I think your lift idea is not a good one at all.  I think the meager, limited resources should be allocated to cutting the next trail in the lookout pod this summer.  And I think that will happen.

That woud be great, I can't wait for that to happen. When it is all done I think the Lookout Pod might rival the Summit when the Slides are not open...(don't throw verbal punches at me) I'm just sayin maybe.

ScottyJack wrote

ausable skier wrote

I was told by others it was 45 mins.  It certainly looked that long -

So I posted it on the internet like it was fact - jack!  (got that from Si - Campy!!)

I think your lift idea is not a good one at all.  I think the meager, limited resources should be allocated to cutting the next trail in the lookout pod this summer.  And I think that will happen.

I tend to beleive the person that told me the 45 min number but it certainly could feel longer than it really was.

While I'd love to see more trails I'm begining to seriously question the viability of the entire Lookout Pod.  It opened and closed so fast this season - it just does not seem to hold snow that well on that ridge and its so rocky.  I think Lookout gets more sun than the summit and that is part of the issue on why the snow melts so fast there.

I figure that the Gondi goes down at least once per week for wind issues and when that happens the ski experience for the average WF customer goes to heck.  When it happens on a holiday week it is a disaster with customers walking away saying never again will they return.    From reading SJ's posts I think he actaully likes wind hold days so he can hike to the goods and have them to himself.   This is the biggest issue WF has to face to improve the over all skier experience and those lifts are soon going to need to be replaced.  I agree putting them together has pros and cons and so maybe the priority is to just replace the Bear lift with a fixed grip quad that can run in high winds.  It may need to be sited differently so that it has a lower wind profile - maybe running from the bottom of wolf to the where the air bag is now.

If Airplanes can be kept in service for 40 50 years why can't a ski lift.  

tjf1967 wrote

If Airplanes can be kept in service for 40 50 years why can't a ski lift.

They can be. Just come ski GP w/ me and I'll show ya----believe me, it's impressive

ausable skier wrote

I figure that the Gondi goes down at least once per week for wind issues and when that happens the ski experience for the average WF customer goes to heck.  When it happens on a holiday week it is a disaster with customers walking away saying never again will they return.  

That's why we need a Belleayre/WF pass. So when the pissed off customer drives down the northway, they can ski at Belleayre for no additional cost.

tom