17 replies to this topic

[edmontonguy]

One of our local hills replaced its aging t-bar with a brand new one of a Canadian kind pulse lift this summer. I was first intrigued when i noticed that the lift had two distinct groupings of chairs with rather large gaps in between. I thought perhaps it was vandalism prevention and that the chairs would be spaced out at a later date, however i was rather surprised to later learn that this weird and wonderful quad was a pulse lift.

Here's a quote from a local news paper:

Quote

Beginning this winter, skiers and snowboarders will be taking unique rides uphill at Snow Valley, which has replaced its longstanding T-bar with a new quad chairlift.

Not only is the lift Edmonton’s only quad chair, Snow Valley general manager Jim Hillman says it is the first in Canada to utilize a pulse design – slowing to 0.8 metres per second for loading and unloading while in between speeding up to a peak of 5 metres per second – and is the only quad in the world that unloads facing downhill.

“We were really trying to make this as efficient as we could for our beginners and new skiers so that it was easy for them,” Hillman says. “What we’re trying to do there is, if we don’t ever have to turn this off because somebody’s had a difficult time getting on or off, then it’s way more efficient.”

With two 20-chair pods, the lift can transport 1,600 people uphill per hour, nearly double the T-bar’s capacity. The ride takes approximately three minutes, Hillman says.

Total cost of the chairlift is just over $1.9 million, with the province providing $600,000 through its Major Community Facilities Program. Many hill users donated to the project and Snow Valley is selling sponsorship of each chair. The lift’s two buildings were built free by Pacesetter Homes.

A few photos from the snow valley website:
 48692_94018.jpg (136.33K)
Number of downloads: 128  74118_90724.jpg (115.28K)
Number of downloads: 113

I'll try to get some photos at some point.

[lift_electrical]

What's the length of the lift?

[edmontonguy]

Very short. Just over 900 feet.

[SkiBachelor]

How does a system like this make sense?

[egieszl]

SkiBachelor, on Dec 16 2008, 06:58 PM, said:

How does a system like this make sense?

This system should be less costly than a detachable lift, but offer nearly all of the benefits and cost less to maintain over the long run. The pulse lift slows down while the pod of chairs or gondolas is in the top and bottom stations making it easy to load an unload and the lift is able to operate a high speed while the pods of chairs are being moved from one station to another.

The only downside is a reduction in overall capacity, but if you don't need to move 2,400 - 2,800 pph then this is less costly alternative with nearly all the benefits.

This post has been edited by egieszl: 16 December 2008 - 07:54 PM

[Lift Dinosaur]

Another "downside" to a pulse lift is the need for larger sheave assemblies for the "point loading" by the group of carriers, and the necessity to move the carriers at a more frequent interval than a regular fixed grip carrier.
In Edmonton, it's probably no big deal.

Dino

[Andoman]

egieszl, on Dec 16 2008, 10:52 PM, said:

This system should be less costly than a detachable lift, but offer nearly all of the benefits and cost less to maintain over the long run. The pulse lift slows down while the pod of chairs or gondolas is in the top and bottom stations making it easy to load an unload and the lift is able to operate a high speed while the pods of chairs are being moved from one station to another.

The only downside is a reduction in overall capacity, but if you don't need to move 2,400 - 2,800 pph then this is less costly alternative with nearly all the benefits.

Seems like it would be less costly/complicated to just operate a slow fixed grip lift for a beginner hill, I would think the capacity would be the same.

[mikest2]

SkiBachelor, on Dec 16 2008, 06:58 PM, said:

How does a system like this make sense?

Never been to Edmonton, have you ? 20 X 4 = 80, 80/10=8 ski school classes
for Andoman..... at 0.8 m/s nobody falls down getting on or off. We run a quad FG for our bunny hill, average speed is 1.5-1.7 m/s with many slows and stops. This is going to be very interesting to watch, I think it has great merit.

[Jonni]

Quote

and is the only quad in the world that unloads facing downhill.

I'd like to see some photos of that!

[aug]

SkiBachelor, on Dec 16 2008, 06:58 PM, said:

How does a system like this make sense?

High speed lift without the detach mechinisims with a few drawbacks

[mthornton]

Panorama has a very nice little pulse gondola, Doppelmayr, built to connect real-estate to the hill in 2001.
The thing is great. It just runs... and about once a week or so someone gets their suitcase stuck in the door.
When it stops (extremely rare), the operators are a bit lost... not sure what to do....this thing never stops!

It was cheap to build, pretty low-tech & elegant design, very easy to maintain. Pretty low capacity... but that's not a priority on a real-estate lift. The cabins are an open cabriolet type, 10 passenger/cabin, stand-up, no windows. Kids, load/unload bikes & baggage no problem.

It's free to ride. On sunny warm days, people like to party-ride it round and round. The cabins are close enough you could pass a joint from one to the other (so I've heard). It runs at night, and racks up 2000Hrs/year. I'm surprised there aren't more of these around.

M

[edmontonguy]

I can't say definitively the reason for installing a pulse lift but i can speculate what a few of the motivators may have been.

Firstly, capacity. On a busy weekend or evening long lines developed at the bottom the former doppelmayr t-bar that ran the same line. Although the number of skiiers coming to the hill isn't likely to increase dramatically, waiting 5-10 minutes in line isn't much fun if the payoff is a 2-3 minute ski.

Secondly, it's friendly for beginners. As has been pointed out, the load and unload speed is incredibly slow which means even if there is a fall it's likely that the lift would not have to slow or stop. The old t-bar was notorious for stopping. Getting up the hill wasn't routine unless you had to either avoid fallen skiiers or come to a stop. As far as the unloading downhill is concerned, i suspect that there is a groomed section on the downhill side of the drive staion so that if someone chickens out, they can just hop back on and ride the lift down without any special procedures for lift ops.

Lastly, and i suspect one of the bigger reasons, marketing. Not only is it Edmonton's ONLY quad, it's Canada's FASTEST fixed grip chairlift. It's also the ONLY chairlift in the world to load downhill. Get my drift... It's hard for any other ski hill in the city to advertise against. Chairlifts are a dime a dozen but this lift has quite some novelty.

There are a few other reasons such as increased terrain (the t-bar broke the hill into essentially two large skiing zones) but i think it was a wise investment on Snow Valley's part. Perhaps more of these will pop up at bunny hills and smaller hills in the praries.

[2milehi]

Looks like your snow making crew can aim as well as ours...

[Lift Kid]

I sure got cold yesterday after being blasted by you're snowmakers!!

[SkiBachelor]

egieszl, on Dec 16 2008, 07:52 PM, said:

This system should be less costly than a detachable lift, but offer nearly all of the benefits and cost less to maintain over the long run. The pulse lift slows down while the pod of chairs or gondolas is in the top and bottom stations making it easy to load an unload and the lift is able to operate a high speed while the pods of chairs are being moved from one station to another.

The only downside is a reduction in overall capacity, but if you don't need to move 2,400 - 2,800 pph then this is less costly alternative with nearly all the benefits.

The reason why I feel this lift doesn't make pratical sense is because the lift is so short. It will only travel at a short high rate of speed for a short period and then have to slow down to unload people. However, then again when you get off and ski down to the bottom, the next bunch of chairs will be loading.

[Haulrope]

It does seem odd, also because whenever the lift is running at full capacity, I could see the line getting a lot longer. Rather than the fairly steady flow, the line would only move every few minutes (or however long it takes the gap between groups of chairs to pass).

When you're working on the bottom alone, it would be nice getting a little break every few minutes, plus you'd have a lot more time to thoroughly check tickets, snowboard leashes, loose clothing, etc. on everybody before they get on. If you could keep the people behind the "wait here" line while the empty part is going by, you could even grade out the ramp for a minute or so.

In all, it doesn't seem that practical to me to use a pulse lift, but after thinking about the 4 hours I spent alone at the bottom of a CTEC tripple this morning, it seems like it would be a fun lift to run.

[Kicking Horse]

Haulrope, on Feb 15 2009, 09:52 PM, said:

In all, it doesn't seem that practical to me to use a pulse lift, but after thinking about the 4 hours I spent alone at the bottom of a CTEC tripple this morning, it seems like it would be a fun lift to run.

How busy was it??? Today we were at 100% Cap (5 to 6 peeps per chair every chair) on the Village Express for 5 hrs.

[Haulrope]

Kicking Horse, on Feb 16 2009, 12:08 AM, said:

How busy was it??? Today we were at 100% Cap (5 to 6 peeps per chair every chair) on the Village Express for 5 hrs.

It was one of those days where the line didn't get that long, but there was a steady enough flow to keep the lift at cap. The line only ended about 50' or so behind the gate (we don't do the maze, our area's too small to need it often), but that got a lot shorter once a night shift guy got there around 1 and we started enforcing the "3 to a chair" rule. When people say they still want to ride alone, I just tell them to go to Mad River Glen and ride the Sunnyside Single.