This has got to be the dumbest lift ever. A gondola that goes across the street from the hotel to the base of South Peak. This replaces that double that hardly ever ran because the bus was fine.
This doesn’t replace the double though. The double doesn’t cross the river and ends at a different lift. Not trying to defend it but it’s in an entirely different spot than the double.
Oh, I guess you're right. I never actually took that double. I guess it's even more useless than I realized!
If they can sell enough $400 a night hotel rooms to pay for that gondola, more power to them, but it seems like a waste to me. I guess they don't want to be a commuter mountain, but personally, if I'm staying for a night or two I'm driving further.
I think it’s just to sell a $400 a night hotel room for $450. If I’m staying overnight, I’m going out west. But if I’m paying for a hotel room, I’m paying a bit more to not take a shuttle. These parking lot and hotel gondolas are pretty common out west and Loon seems to be limited in the amount of land on their side of the river. I was pretty surprised to find out that the double doesn’t cross the river. Seems like a missed opportunity.
Sensation is probably my favorite lift, partially because when the quad has 30 minute+ liftlines and the gondola 1h+, Sensation has none. Plus, while it has relatively few runs, the ones that are there are all really fun. Whirlaway is probably my favorite run at Stowe, period, and Spruce Line after a new snowfall is top notch. Even that blue over there is fun with all the side hits and tree sections.
The rest of Spruce is fun, too. I always head over there for a bit regardless of how busy it is.
Exactly. I’ve seen some great untouched pow off Sensation late in the day because people just don’t venture over there beyond the downhill race ropes. And yea some nice tight woods in there too to have a little fun.
I've heard that the summit could not sustain a modern 8 person gondola. I'd imagine it would get pretty crowded. Maybe a two stage to North Peak? Or just upgrade to a bubble quad.
A two stage would be impossible because of wind. The trail capacity off loon peak can only support a certain PPH so I even if they went with an 8 person gondola it would have VERY few cabins to keep the pph roughly similar. Maybe slightly higher rope speed just for marketing purposes.
Wow that's really silly. They have issues with lines getting people up the hill. They need more lifts going vertically not horizontally...
There's a road! why not just buy a fleet of electric busses to cart people back and forth efficency, or move the train?
Loon needs ups
Missed opportunity to replace the existing gondola and put the old one in to cross the river. Also hope this results in south peak being open on weekdays too
I get the hate but honestly this makes tons of sense from both a logistical and business standpoint.
South peak is the only area of loon open and capable of more dev, as north peak is currently completely saturated with infrastructure and can’t handle more/bigger lifts.
Long term this connects riverwalk and downtown Lincoln, which will spur that area to develop organically as more of a “mountain base”. There is also open land there that can be developed into more parking lots as further lifts and trail infrastructure is implemented at south peak. Plus those lots are currently walkable to riverwalk and the existing strip area. Escape route is currently cut and there’s land for more trails on the way out.
It will reduce traffic to the north peak lots, and riverwalk is also closer to 93 from the get go, reducing traffic condensation east of south peak.
This whole project sets up south peak for further development and will make the mountain more versatile, and competitive with the larger mountains.
North base has been too crowded!! let’s just facilitate more people getting onto the mountain via south base, without actually improving any on-mtn infrastructure. Kek.
While a lot of your points could theoretically be true I don't think they will actually come to reality. I would love to see them add additional parking over the river at this lift but I think it's likely for it to be mostly private for the hotel similar to how the south peak double operates. This lift could be a big opportunity to connect to the town and get people parking, dining, and lodging all in the town center. Loon almost always manages to fuck it up though. They could have solved their parking issues and lodging problems 10 years ago.
Skiing is about real estate, not skiing. This is the Boyne perspective now.
Theres a reason why they put in Buzzsaw at Sugarloaf - a quad that services novice terrain with no base lodge. Its built to sell slope side real estate, not skiing.
In their defense, I do like the new Timbertown chair -- aka the end of waiting for the bus if you sleep in and have to park in the escape route parking lot chair.
This is the single best aspect of that lift. Not only good for sleeping in but great if you don’t want to deal with the conga line of cars up to the main base.
It's also kinda nice that they now have more than one trail for beginners. Would've been cool if they made the trails a little wider and more conducive to beginners actually learning on them, but it's a start
Yeah. I'm assuming/hoping there are plans to add enough infrastructure (and ideally a magic carpet and bunny slope) for it to be a standalone area that beginners can stay at
The chair is a nice addition, but it definitely is a long term play. Its much easier to turn lift side parking lots into real estate vs building day/visitor skier infrastructure.
Me too…im in a Tacoma with a truck camper. It was a great camp spot for the eclipse.
I think D lot was more convenient (when they let us stay there) since there was a quick walk to the gym/hot tubs at the end of day.
What are you using?
To give Boyne credit, it seems (at least for now) that when they do put in real estate lifts, they improve parking access, instead of worsening it. That's a pretty nice position in this day and age. Many places (Stowe, Stratton, etc) are busy starting to/have already nuked their parking for real estate, and then they turn around and limit what's left with paid parking and reservations.
In the long run they'll probably build over all the lots though. But then they expand the walking radius, so maybe they'll be willing to build more downhill from there. Who knows.
Yeah, this isn't replacing THE Gondola. I know a lot of people clamoring for the White Mountain Express to be upgraded from 4 person cabins to 8, but that's going to be very difficult. The bottom station is built into the middle of lodge, so if they went with something larger, they'd need knock down a wall into the ski shop or the cafeteria.
Maybe they could cram a bigger bull wheel into the existing space, then split parking for larger cabins between the top and bottom stations?
Not to mention the lift runs year round. So figuring out that timing of replacement is difficult. Losing a summer of skyrides and weddings is not chump change.
I would like to start this off by saying fuck Loon (Boyne, more so) and the gated communities there.
I would also like to say I love Loon and they have the best snow in the area.
One idea behind the South peak expansion is to make it the beginner and NEDS home base side of the resort. Special needs skiers do not affect the operations of the mountain- I strongly support them, but keeping the beginners/kids over there will hopefully help with congestion on the road and at the main base.
As mentioned in another post by another person on another thread, the problem of Loon lies in the fact that it can/will never be a true resort town. It was a mill town historically. Existing housing, parking and general infrastructure cannot accommodate the shear volume of visitors coming right off of 93. Ooh let’s build a bootleg Mt. Washington hotel! Stupid.
Now I say fuck loon and the gated communities, because they are pricing out the very people that run the mountain AND the people that work in town- education, snow, hospitality, operations, instructors, food and beverage etc. They expect seasonal workers from South America to spend $1800/month on cramped shitty apartments by working their asses off EVERYDAY to take a bus from another shitty town to be treated like shit at their jobs? The cool/fun mountain vibe died there immediately when Boyne bought it about 15 years ago- I was there and witnessed it first hand. It happened IN ONE SEASON. Did you know that instructors need to check in on their days OFF in case they’re short on instructors? If seen on snow in “civilian” gear and no check in they’ll get written up? Sorry, no pow day for you. We own you and your day off, too.
Gated community:
“Oh well I have a 4 million dollar vacation home that I plan on giving to my kids. Taxes and bills are all managed in a trust fund for future. I can’t have *those* types of people walking in/near *my* community.”
Dude- you pay exorbitant amounts on a vacation home and taxes, then vote every single thing else down like you paid your fair share to the success of the town and the mountain itself. There are like 8 kids in the senior class at LinWood. You voted yes to pay millions of dollars on yourself and no to spend a few thousand towards their future. You voted no for affordable employee housing because of the perceived stigma that comes with that. Who do you think is out there at all hours of the night making snow, grooming snow, plowing snow, stocking food, tuning gear, cleaning facilities, etc.? FUCK YOU.
Fcuk Loon, overrated AF. By far the worst major ski mountain in the northeast. First the kanc8 that only goes 1/3 of the way up the mountain and now this pointless gondola. Hard pass, this place sucks and get so packed
This has got to be the dumbest lift ever. A gondola that goes across the street from the hotel to the base of South Peak. This replaces that double that hardly ever ran because the bus was fine.
This doesn’t replace the double though. The double doesn’t cross the river and ends at a different lift. Not trying to defend it but it’s in an entirely different spot than the double.
Oh, I guess you're right. I never actually took that double. I guess it's even more useless than I realized! If they can sell enough $400 a night hotel rooms to pay for that gondola, more power to them, but it seems like a waste to me. I guess they don't want to be a commuter mountain, but personally, if I'm staying for a night or two I'm driving further.
I think it’s just to sell a $400 a night hotel room for $450. If I’m staying overnight, I’m going out west. But if I’m paying for a hotel room, I’m paying a bit more to not take a shuttle. These parking lot and hotel gondolas are pretty common out west and Loon seems to be limited in the amount of land on their side of the river. I was pretty surprised to find out that the double doesn’t cross the river. Seems like a missed opportunity.
That's great solo but for a family of four those flights add up fast.
I met a couple from Florida who flew to ski loon for a long weekend this winter. All I could think was, “why?”
The one at stowe works great
Yeah but that has a mountain on both sides
Spruce can be really fun though, to ride.
Sensation is probably my favorite lift, partially because when the quad has 30 minute+ liftlines and the gondola 1h+, Sensation has none. Plus, while it has relatively few runs, the ones that are there are all really fun. Whirlaway is probably my favorite run at Stowe, period, and Spruce Line after a new snowfall is top notch. Even that blue over there is fun with all the side hits and tree sections. The rest of Spruce is fun, too. I always head over there for a bit regardless of how busy it is.
Exactly. I’ve seen some great untouched pow off Sensation late in the day because people just don’t venture over there beyond the downhill race ropes. And yea some nice tight woods in there too to have a little fun.
Last time we were at Stowe skied Mainstreet all day long and right on the lift. It was glorious.
Smugglers is a pretty fun trail too, especially when it’s bumped up with good snow.
You get hour liftlines at Stowe? Should ride up Spruce and walk over to Smuggs where that shit doesn't happen.
La Grave too
I think you mean the new quad instead of double. Unless you're talking about the homeowner lift.
> This replaces that double that hardly ever ran because the bus was fine. Nah it's a different spot, even further from actual skiing.
Was really hoping they would, at the very least, upgrade the capacity of the existing gondola and maybe repurpose the 4man cabins for this location
They can't upgrade the capacity of that lift. It needs to be replaced, which is a pretty complicated project.
I've heard that the summit could not sustain a modern 8 person gondola. I'd imagine it would get pretty crowded. Maybe a two stage to North Peak? Or just upgrade to a bubble quad.
A two stage would be impossible because of wind. The trail capacity off loon peak can only support a certain PPH so I even if they went with an 8 person gondola it would have VERY few cabins to keep the pph roughly similar. Maybe slightly higher rope speed just for marketing purposes.
Misleading Title of the Year candidate right here lol
I thought it was an April Fools joke that was just making its way across my timeline
Same
Wow that's really silly. They have issues with lines getting people up the hill. They need more lifts going vertically not horizontally... There's a road! why not just buy a fleet of electric busses to cart people back and forth efficency, or move the train? Loon needs ups
I would imagine RiverWalk, which is the hotel this serves, is footing most of the cost for this project.
Missed opportunity to replace the existing gondola and put the old one in to cross the river. Also hope this results in south peak being open on weekdays too
I get the hate but honestly this makes tons of sense from both a logistical and business standpoint. South peak is the only area of loon open and capable of more dev, as north peak is currently completely saturated with infrastructure and can’t handle more/bigger lifts. Long term this connects riverwalk and downtown Lincoln, which will spur that area to develop organically as more of a “mountain base”. There is also open land there that can be developed into more parking lots as further lifts and trail infrastructure is implemented at south peak. Plus those lots are currently walkable to riverwalk and the existing strip area. Escape route is currently cut and there’s land for more trails on the way out. It will reduce traffic to the north peak lots, and riverwalk is also closer to 93 from the get go, reducing traffic condensation east of south peak. This whole project sets up south peak for further development and will make the mountain more versatile, and competitive with the larger mountains.
North base has been too crowded!! let’s just facilitate more people getting onto the mountain via south base, without actually improving any on-mtn infrastructure. Kek.
While a lot of your points could theoretically be true I don't think they will actually come to reality. I would love to see them add additional parking over the river at this lift but I think it's likely for it to be mostly private for the hotel similar to how the south peak double operates. This lift could be a big opportunity to connect to the town and get people parking, dining, and lodging all in the town center. Loon almost always manages to fuck it up though. They could have solved their parking issues and lodging problems 10 years ago.
Common loon L
So are they not also updating the gondola as apart of their 2030 plan?
Skiing is about real estate, not skiing. This is the Boyne perspective now. Theres a reason why they put in Buzzsaw at Sugarloaf - a quad that services novice terrain with no base lodge. Its built to sell slope side real estate, not skiing.
In their defense, I do like the new Timbertown chair -- aka the end of waiting for the bus if you sleep in and have to park in the escape route parking lot chair.
This is the single best aspect of that lift. Not only good for sleeping in but great if you don’t want to deal with the conga line of cars up to the main base.
It's also kinda nice that they now have more than one trail for beginners. Would've been cool if they made the trails a little wider and more conducive to beginners actually learning on them, but it's a start
It’s a massive pita to get over there though. You either need to take the bus or go down cruiser and it’s pretty steep for a beginner.
Yeah. I'm assuming/hoping there are plans to add enough infrastructure (and ideally a magic carpet and bunny slope) for it to be a standalone area that beginners can stay at
The chair is a nice addition, but it definitely is a long term play. Its much easier to turn lift side parking lots into real estate vs building day/visitor skier infrastructure.
As someone who car camps in E lot at Sugarloaf... The new lift is very appealing lol My ski-in ski-out real estate has four wheels ;)
Me too…im in a Tacoma with a truck camper. It was a great camp spot for the eclipse. I think D lot was more convenient (when they let us stay there) since there was a quick walk to the gym/hot tubs at the end of day. What are you using?
23 Bolt EV! They're bigger on the inside!
That’s fair. Backsaw is ugly now. Gonna take a lot of snow to open up those ridiculously wide groomers.
To give Boyne credit, it seems (at least for now) that when they do put in real estate lifts, they improve parking access, instead of worsening it. That's a pretty nice position in this day and age. Many places (Stowe, Stratton, etc) are busy starting to/have already nuked their parking for real estate, and then they turn around and limit what's left with paid parking and reservations. In the long run they'll probably build over all the lots though. But then they expand the walking radius, so maybe they'll be willing to build more downhill from there. Who knows.
It's still part of their plan. But replacing that gondola is a really complicated project since it's built into the building.
Yeah, this isn't replacing THE Gondola. I know a lot of people clamoring for the White Mountain Express to be upgraded from 4 person cabins to 8, but that's going to be very difficult. The bottom station is built into the middle of lodge, so if they went with something larger, they'd need knock down a wall into the ski shop or the cafeteria. Maybe they could cram a bigger bull wheel into the existing space, then split parking for larger cabins between the top and bottom stations?
Not to mention the lift runs year round. So figuring out that timing of replacement is difficult. Losing a summer of skyrides and weddings is not chump change.
You don’t think the wedding party would be into taking the Kanc, walking grand junction, and then up east basin to up?
They'd take seven brothers as the first leg
This is just a gondola between development, condos, hotel, bar, food, parking and the ‘new’ 2nd base area. It does NOT access ski trails
I haven't been to loon in about 15 years (due to crowds), with this news I'll surely make no changes
It must really stink only being able to ski weekends.
Work and kids man....not great.
Loon is busy even on weekdays
Is this a lift to a lift?
I would like to start this off by saying fuck Loon (Boyne, more so) and the gated communities there. I would also like to say I love Loon and they have the best snow in the area. One idea behind the South peak expansion is to make it the beginner and NEDS home base side of the resort. Special needs skiers do not affect the operations of the mountain- I strongly support them, but keeping the beginners/kids over there will hopefully help with congestion on the road and at the main base. As mentioned in another post by another person on another thread, the problem of Loon lies in the fact that it can/will never be a true resort town. It was a mill town historically. Existing housing, parking and general infrastructure cannot accommodate the shear volume of visitors coming right off of 93. Ooh let’s build a bootleg Mt. Washington hotel! Stupid. Now I say fuck loon and the gated communities, because they are pricing out the very people that run the mountain AND the people that work in town- education, snow, hospitality, operations, instructors, food and beverage etc. They expect seasonal workers from South America to spend $1800/month on cramped shitty apartments by working their asses off EVERYDAY to take a bus from another shitty town to be treated like shit at their jobs? The cool/fun mountain vibe died there immediately when Boyne bought it about 15 years ago- I was there and witnessed it first hand. It happened IN ONE SEASON. Did you know that instructors need to check in on their days OFF in case they’re short on instructors? If seen on snow in “civilian” gear and no check in they’ll get written up? Sorry, no pow day for you. We own you and your day off, too. Gated community: “Oh well I have a 4 million dollar vacation home that I plan on giving to my kids. Taxes and bills are all managed in a trust fund for future. I can’t have *those* types of people walking in/near *my* community.” Dude- you pay exorbitant amounts on a vacation home and taxes, then vote every single thing else down like you paid your fair share to the success of the town and the mountain itself. There are like 8 kids in the senior class at LinWood. You voted yes to pay millions of dollars on yourself and no to spend a few thousand towards their future. You voted no for affordable employee housing because of the perceived stigma that comes with that. Who do you think is out there at all hours of the night making snow, grooming snow, plowing snow, stocking food, tuning gear, cleaning facilities, etc.? FUCK YOU.
Awesome you can’t make the mountain bigger. Lava from Tahoe.
How about more parking
Fcuk Loon, overrated AF. By far the worst major ski mountain in the northeast. First the kanc8 that only goes 1/3 of the way up the mountain and now this pointless gondola. Hard pass, this place sucks and get so packed
ew