12 replies to this topic

[spunkyskier01]

i was reading about vip cabins in another post,m and it got me wondering, what other ski areas have vip cabins i know killington and deer valley do, what about other ski areas?

[edmontonguy]

Kicking Horse in BC has at least one VIP cabin. It's decked out with the usual leather sofas and other amenities as well as having a CD player. In order to get one of these babies to ride in, you have to shell out a pretty penny to stay in one of two rooms at the top of the mountain in the eagle's eye restaurant. I beleive the order of expense is something nearing or exceeding $1000 per night for one of the rooms. In my opinion a VIP cabin would be really nice for this ride which is in excess of 12 minutes. It'd be a nice way to work out the kinks 1200m of vertical can do to you. Kicking Horse also offers priority loading to VIPs so they don't have to wait around for their cabin.

[SkiBachelor]

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Kicking Horse in BC has at least one VIP cabin. It's decked out with the usual leather sofas and other amenities as well as having a CD player. In order to get one of these babies to ride in, you have to shell out a pretty penny to stay in one of two rooms at the top of the mountain in the eagle's eye restaurant. I beleive the order of expense is something nearing or exceeding $1000 per night for one of the rooms. In my opinion a VIP cabin would be really nice for this ride which is in excess of 12 minutes. It'd be a nice way to work out the kinks 1200m of vertical can do to you. Kicking Horse also offers priority loading to VIPs so they don't have to wait around for their cabin.

I'm confuesed, what if the VIP cabin has already left the lower station when the group arrives to ride in it? Do they have to sit around for 24 minutes (the cabin must go up and then back down)?

[WBSKI]

Yep theres a VIP cabin at Kicking Horse, i saw it. They keep it in the bottom parking area, i will check my site to see if i have a pic

I dont have any good pics but heres one of where it is, i think they keep it on the end of the parking line. http://www.skibc.lostpeaks.info/mtn/Kickin...es/IMG_1894.JPG

[SkiBachelor]

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DV does not have vip cabins on it dola. Never did when i worked there.Before the dola was built there had been talk , where the home owners in the Deer Crest area of the reosrt could buy a cabin, have it decked out to thier specs. It would only be loaded onto the line, the day the owner was going to be skiing there. Then the powers above at the resort said no, this woud be to time consuming for Lift Maint, ad Lift Ops. So it was agreed on specing the cabins , as you see them now, and going that route.Then again i could be wrong, if mcjones has an update, it owuld be helpfull.

TR, the Deer Valley VIP cabin is located in the parking lot in front of shop 5 (I think that's the name). It's the shop that is connected to where the sheave liners are pressed and there is a building on the other side to my knowledge. I wish I got a picture of it.

[edmontonguy]

from what i understood it as, at kicking horse, they give visitors priority loading, or in ofther words lift line skipping, when the VIP gondola is not there and they want to get back up the mountain. Otherwise they have to wait until the cabin returns to the station. I'm not sure if they pull it off the line after each trip during regular operation or if it just stays on the line all day. One is taxing on the Lifties and one is annoying for the skiiers, however i think the reason to give the whole priority loading thing to VIPs is to allow the cabin to stay on the line all the time and then it enables the VIPs to still have some sort of status even if they're not in the designated cabin.

[SkiBachelor]

That would be the cabin then TR. The gondola's windows were missing and the enterior looked like crap. There were also speakers still inside the cabin but where the radio was, that entire panel was missing.

[floridaskier]

formerliftforeman, on Oct 7 2005, 06:03 PM, said:

If it's the cabin you refer to,, It used to be out in front of Snowpark,advertising that DV now has a gondola. It was set up with a table inside. Best to my knowledge, it nevr saw any air time on the dola.
Can you describe what you saw?
No need to bring cabins from the dola station, over to the shop for repairs, all that work is done at the dola lower term. So iam thinking what you saw was the cabin used to promote the dola in it first couple of season.

The cabin that was out in front of Snow Park the season before the gondola opened wasn't really like the ones that went on to the real lift. If I remember right, it had six seats instead of four, a table in the middle like you said, a radio, lights, and other stuff that never made it onto the real gondola.
And yes, there's a big parking and maintainance room at the bottom of the gondola:

[mcjones55]

The cabin a the shop was a "demo" cabin that the deer crest development had when deer crest was being build. I belive it's been scavenged for parts. As for the table, radio and lights, they exist, but the battery charging system never worked, so no radio or lights, and the tables were to be used for the evening service to the restaurant at the top of the Dola. The restaurant is still in the works last I heard. and if that goes thru, i'm sure there will then be a reason to get the lights and radio working, but for now those things are not important or needed for our operations.

[phillybluntz]

edmontonguy, on Oct 5 2005, 10:07 PM, said:

from what i understood it as, at kicking horse, they give visitors priority loading, or in ofther words lift line skipping, when the VIP gondola is not there and they want to get back up the mountain. Otherwise they have to wait until the cabin returns to the station. I'm not sure if they pull it off the line after each trip during regular operation or if it just stays on the line all day. One is taxing on the Lifties and one is annoying for the skiiers, however i think the reason to give the whole priority loading thing to VIPs is to allow the cabin to stay on the line all the time and then it enables the VIPs to still have some sort of status even if they're not in the designated cabin.

Theres two of them so it is only a 12 min wait if it leaves the station

[arialropewaymillwright]

The Kicking horse cabins were purchsed for the afor mentioned purpose. At 20+Cnd grand each at the time they were not going over well with the hords of skiers having to watch them either sit idle or go past and wait a full minute before another cabin to enter the station. When management finally gave in and put them into service they were quicky vandalized and one of the blaunkpuat cd players was stolen.
True story the end
Ps they have since doubled the cabins on the line

[highspeedquad]

How large is a VIP cabin compared to other cabins?

[edmontonguy]

They are always identical to the size of the cabin on the lift. Generally the only difference is in the interior which usually comes with a reduction of capacity of the car, typically an 8 passenger car will only seat 4 when it is converted to a VIP car. External Mods may be added, but the size of the cabin will remain the same.