217 replies to this topic

[ewillso7]

floridaskier, on 27 August 2010 - 05:40 AM, said:

Here's a little money-is-no-object fantasy map I drew of The Canyons, dated June 2007, designed to fix everything I thought was wrong with the place at the time, and mostly still is:

1. Abandon the village for day skiers. Realign the Red Hawk lift to start right in the middle of the hotels, and I realigned the gondola and Cabriolet to be by the bottom terminal of the Golden Eagle HSQ to the right of the village. Build a real base lodge for day skiers down there like every other resort has.
2. Sunrise lift is a transfer to Tombstone. It's not very far. Alternatively, just build a road and a parking lot there
3. Snow Canyon lift realigned so it's much longer and doesn't go from nowhere to nowhere. Build a new lodge on the site of old Buffalo Bob's at the bottom of Super Condor to replace the head-scratcher location (and terrible menu) of the Sun Lodge.
4. Silverado lift added to make it easier to do laps on the north-facing side of Lookout Peak. ParkWest had a lift in this alignment.
5. Lookout lift is renamed and realigned to start right next to the gondola summit and end at the same place for two-way transfers. This was the best lift ASC ever installed.
6. Extend Saddleback to the top of the ridge and add more terrain.
7. New Red Pine lift starts at the Red Pine Lodge and makes use of the wasted north-facing space behind and above Tombstone and below 9990. It's not too steep in this area, and it would add some nice mid-mountain intermediate terrain, which is sorely lacking right now.
8. Tombstone, Super Condor, and 9990 remain exactly as they are. ASC got these right.
9. Peak 5 lift replaced and extended uhigher up the ridge. This would be some tough terrain up here, and a green cattrack back to the bottom of 9990 would be needed
10. Dreamscape lift replaced with a high speed quad starting below where Dreamcatcher is now. Build a lodge down there. Day Break high speed quad goes from there to the top of Peak 5 to make it easier to get back and to add some good skiing there.
11. Dreamcatcher lift would be up the other side of Iron Mountain from the new lift.
12. New base lodge where Iron Mountain and Timberline lifts are now, with parking and a restaurant. From there, the Royal lift adds skiing along the actual fall line in the vast wasteland currently traversed by the awful Harmony run. the Tranquility lift has a midstation to take people back to Tombstone from the south side of the resort.

Give me $100 million and I'll make it happen. What do you all think?

Wow, you're certainly dreaming big on this one. It's an ambitious plan but I like what your thinking.

Proving access to the southern peaks, like 9900, 5 Dreamscape through a new access point is a simple and brilliant idea. Right now, with everything funneling to the Tombstone lift, it's a mess to get back.
The Canyons really have a challenge in bulding this resort the right way. This is what happens when you put a ski resort in a bunch of ravines. I'd personally do more than just realign the gondola too. If I've taken 2 lifts already, I want to get some real skiing done.

I have several friends in Utah who never go near the Canyons due to the poor lift structure, it's a shame the lifts hold back good terrain.

[Tin Woodsman]

ewillso7, on 28 August 2010 - 04:38 AM, said:

Wow, you're certainly dreaming big on this one. It's an ambitious plan but I like what your thinking.

Proving access to the southern peaks, like 9900, 5 Dreamscape through a new access point is a simple and brilliant idea. Right now, with everything funneling to the Tombstone lift, it's a mess to get back.
The Canyons really have a challenge in bulding this resort the right way. This is what happens when you put a ski resort in a bunch of ravines. I'd personally do more than just realign the gondola too. If I've taken 2 lifts already, I want to get some real skiing done.

I have several friends in Utah who never go near the Canyons due to the poor lift structure, it's a shame the lifts hold back good terrain.

It's not a function of building a ski resort in a bunch of ravines. It's a function of prioritizing real estate ahead of skiing. As others have alluded to, ASC's biggest mistake was not raizing the existing, decrepit base area and moving it to the general proximity of the Tombstone base. Better snow preservation and a MUCH more natural jumping off point for the 2/3 (maybe 3/4?) of Canyons terrain to the south of Red Pine Canyon (I think that's the name of the ravine between Lookout Mtn and the Red Pine lodge area). Instead, they had visions of The Colony in their eyes, preventing the correct move from a skier's perspective. If they had shifted that base area, you would be able to quickly access the majority of Canyons' terrain with 1-2 lift rides from the base and, wonder of wonders, actually ski down to the base of the ski area at the end of the day w/o needing to download or plot it out with a sextant. The current Tombstone alignment works well and, with the addition of another high capacity lift running from near its base up to where Peak 5 offloads, you'd have 2000' vert of continuous runs containing a mix of cruisers and steeps. These two lifts would be the first thing you see and would have largely eliminated The Canyon's rep for having short runs off ridges with flat run outs. From the tops of those two lifts you could actually ski down to the current bases of Saddleback, Dreamscape, Dreamcatcher and Iron Mtn, instead of requiring 2-3 lifts to get to there. Stick a big mid-mtn lodge where the base of Peak 5 and 9990 are today, another one at the base of Super Condor (with the Silverado lift mentioned by floridaskier) and you have everything you need. As floridaskier recommends, run Snow Canyon further up that ridge to access some real skiing. Rip out that BS real estate lift Daybreak and replace it with two lifts starting at its current base and running in opposite directions to the 9800'+ heights of the ridge with BCC. High elevation with lots of snow up there and a bunch of north facing terrain.

Call it quits and go home, content that you've built the best ski area in PC and one that can easily attract the masses you need to later sell real estate on the still abundant land at the flat base of the mountain.

This post has been edited by Tin Woodsman: 17 September 2010 - 03:40 PM

[Tin Woodsman]

Tin Woodsman, on 17 September 2010 - 03:36 PM, said:

It's not a function of building a ski resort in a bunch of ravines. It's a function of prioritizing real estate ahead of skiing. As others have alluded to, ASC's biggest mistake was not raizing the existing, decrepit base area and moving it to the general proximity of the Tombstone base. Better snow preservation and a MUCH more natural jumping off point for the 2/3 (maybe 3/4?) of Canyons terrain to the south of Red Pine Canyon (I think that's the name of the ravine between Lookout Mtn and the Red Pine lodge area). Instead, they had visions of The Colony in their eyes, preventing the correct move from a skier's perspective. If they had shifted that base area, you would be able to quickly access the majority of Canyons' terrain with 1-2 lift rides from the base and, wonder of wonders, actually ski down to the base of the ski area at the end of the day w/o needing to download or plot it out with a sextant. The current Tombstone alignment works well and, with the addition of another high capacity lift running from near its base up to where Peak 5 offloads, you'd have 2000' vert of continuous runs containing a mix of cruisers and steeps. These two lifts would be the first thing you see and would have largely eliminated The Canyon's rep for having short runs off ridges with flat run outs. From the tops of those two lifts you could actually ski down to the current bases of Saddleback, Dreamscape, Dreamcatcher and Iron Mtn, instead of requiring 2-3 lifts to get to there. Stick a big mid-mtn lodge where the base of Peak 5 and 9990 are today, another one at the base of Super Condor (with the Silverado lift mentioned by floridaskier) and you have everything you need. As floridaskier recommends, run Snow Canyon further up that ridge to access some real skiing. Rip out that BS real estate lift Daybreak and replace it with two lifts starting at its current base and running in opposite directions to the 9800'+ heights of the ridge with BCC. High elevation with lots of snow up there and a bunch of north facing terrain.

Call it quits and go home, content that you've built the best ski area in PC and one that can easily attract the masses you need to later sell real estate on the still abundant land at the flat base of the mountain.

Instead of just describing it, here's is what I'm talking about:
What Canyons Should Have Been

This post has been edited by Tin Woodsman: 17 September 2010 - 04:30 PM

[timberlaker]

All that work will still not get me to ski there

[ewillso7]

Tin Woodsman, on 17 September 2010 - 04:29 PM, said:

Instead of just describing it, here's is what I'm talking about:
What Canyons Should Have Been

Impressive analysis.

Certainly, being able to drive to Tombstone would be a huge advantage. You could easily access that entire area of the mountain without taking chairlifts for 30 minutes. Now, moving the base village is quite ambitious, but I don't think it's worth the cost for Canyons. How much have they already commited with these recent changes?

I'm sure they have a master plan, I'm VERY curious to see what they've got planned for year 2-3. They certainly need to make returns from Super Condor/Snow Canyon easier so you don't need to jump on a J-Bar to ski back. Can they afford to design a completely new lift system that gets skiers to where they go?

[Peter]

From The Canyons' Facebook Page:

Quote

The Canyons Golf Course will officially begin construction spring 2011 for completion August 2013.

[floridaskier]

Another image that makes it look like the gondola will have an angle station about three towers up instead of a line turn. It seems like this would be way more expensive than relocating a few towers, but maybe the angle change was too much.



The howdoyoumountain.com website might be hinting at the new logo in the address bar. It's similar to the current logo, but with only one mountain. Green and gold are sticking around, it looks like. Cool picture of Lookout Peak on there too. The lift on the left is the old Golden Eagle, and Short Cut lift is on the right. The building is the Lookout Cabin lodge

[SkiBachelor]

It's an angled station. Saw the new mid terminal today at Leitner-Poma.

[Peter]

Are they moving the current bottom station to become the second stage's bottom station and building 2 new terminals for the bottom stage? Or are they just building a new angle station? Are the new terminals like the original 1997 ones or is it the current Poma Omega terminal design?

[SkiBachelor]

I do not know about terminal the model. I only saw the terminal frame as it has not yet been skinned. However, L-P is doing the entire project, like relocating the bottom terminal. The current bottom terminal will remain the bottom terminal.

[Tin Woodsman]

ewillso7, on 21 September 2010 - 08:40 AM, said:

Impressive analysis.

Certainly, being able to drive to Tombstone would be a huge advantage. You could easily access that entire area of the mountain without taking chairlifts for 30 minutes. Now, moving the base village is quite ambitious, but I don't think it's worth the cost for Canyons. How much have they already commited with these recent changes?

I'm sure they have a master plan, I'm VERY curious to see what they've got planned for year 2-3. They certainly need to make returns from Super Condor/Snow Canyon easier so you don't need to jump on a J-Bar to ski back. Can they afford to design a completely new lift system that gets skiers to where they go?

That is more about what they SHOULD HAVE done rather than any suggestion as to what they could or should do in the future. With all the money invested in the existing base area, that ship has sailed. What I would say is that, just like other large destination resorts (Snowmass, Vail, Winter Park, Keystone, Copper, W/B, Mammoth), they should endeavor to add some sort of additional access point for day skiers outside of the Village. At some point, you'll by trying to squeeze too much into a set up that really isn't appropriate for mass access and egress. Once they reach a point where they feel the Village has some level of critical mass, it would be incumbent upon them, IMO, to add some sort of day skier parking lot and small base lodge near the base of Tombstone. Maybe they don't build that lift from the base up to Peak 5, but at least getting people directly onto Tombstone would eliminate the trifesta of clusterf*cks that are Sidewinder, end-of-day egress to the village, and the necessity of taking three lifts up and across the hill just to start skiing.

[ewillso7]

Tin Woodsman, on 22 September 2010 - 11:40 AM, said:

That is more about what they SHOULD HAVE done rather than any suggestion as to what they could or should do in the future. With all the money invested in the existing base area, that ship has sailed. What I would say is that, just like other large destination resorts (Snowmass, Vail, Winter Park, Keystone, Copper, W/B, Mammoth), they should endeavor to add some sort of additional access point for day skiers outside of the Village. At some point, you'll by trying to squeeze too much into a set up that really isn't appropriate for mass access and egress. Once they reach a point where they feel the Village has some level of critical mass, it would be incumbent upon them, IMO, to add some sort of day skier parking lot and small base lodge near the base of Tombstone. Maybe they don't build that lift from the base up to Peak 5, but at least getting people directly onto Tombstone would eliminate the trifesta of clusterf*cks that are Sidewinder, end-of-day egress to the village, and the necessity of taking three lifts up and across the hill just to start skiing.

The Tombstone access point would be a huge upgrade. It certainly would allow you to have immediate access to great terrain without hussling through two gondolas and taking flat trails down to Tombstone.

Honestly, I would just encourage them to extend some of their current lifts further up the peaks. There's so much good terrain up there, especially Square Top, that everyone could enjoy.

[floridaskier]

Progress on Golden Eagle. Is that a Uni-G I see? It looks like a concrete support

[floridaskier]

The gondola base was moved today. Pictures are up on the facebook album. You can see the Golden Eagle base next to the old gondola base too. Hopefully a new paint job is coming too. Did they strip some of the paint off for the move, or did it really look that bad last season?

http://www.facebook....5&id=9921027191

[Peter]

floridaskier, on 15 October 2010 - 11:18 AM, said:

Hopefully a new paint job is coming too. Did they strip some of the paint off for the move, or did it really look that bad last season?

This picture was taken in August and it looked much better. Must have stripped it in preparation for a new color scheme.

Attached File(s)

•  4957679413_fb92813575_o.jpg (422.92K)
  Number of downloads: 120

[tommyadrian5]

Is the new golden eagle lift going to pass right over the new snowmaking pond? A couple of the pictures on the facebook page make it seem that way.

[floridaskier]

It sure looks like it, about two towers from the top terminal.

I wonder if the midstation on Golden Eagle will be a half-station only. It doesn't look like the angle of the line changes at all.

[tommyadrian5]

Is there a midstation at all? My understanding is that it is a straight shot up the mountain.

[Peter]

There is a midstation, in fact you could see the foundations for it before the webcam went down.

[skier2]

tommyadrian5, on 17 October 2010 - 08:10 AM, said:

Is the new golden eagle lift going to pass right over the new snowmaking pond? A couple of the pictures on the facebook page make it seem that way.

Attached File(s)

•  1287593189PondView_800.jpg (297.9K)
  Number of downloads: 84