I hope not. This will solidify my plans to get to laurel this year. Hopefully someone tries some sort of anti-trust with vail. Buying 3 ski areas, then closing down two without a sale? seems like they want no competition in the area.
If that happens, maybe the knob can get some cheap second hand equipment from those areas (or at least an investor who would see the knob as a viable vail competitor). Imagine if ikon/alterra bought blue knob to compete for western PA visits. We would finally see everything the knob could be.
IDK. I think it will hinge entirely on skier days, especially somewhere like HV. LM is obviously the low hanging fruit, I can't imagine it's break even (let alone profitable) and it has serious limitations for amenities and other activities, not to mention a DCNR guy who's hell bent on making his mark at the expense of those who pay for the place (tax payers). Nutting never should have been permitted to get LM when Buncher expressed interest. But I digress.
...and now for some good news.
Hidden Valley today.
Laurel
Seven Springs
I sure hope not. I've envied all the retired skiers on this forum for years. This summer, I joined the "I don't have to ski on weekends" group.
I was looking forward to some mid week, bluebird days at each of the 3 in the coming years.
HVdad wrote:
It's likely only at the rumor stage, but word on the street is that Vail Resorts, Inc. will be limiting skiing this year to the weekend at Laurel Mountain, and Hidden Valley will be shuttered on Mondays. Can't argue with accountants from a business perspective. That said, given the prevailing economic conditions, my guess is that they'll close Laurel in the 24/25 season, and Hidden Valley will be mothballed a year or two after that. No investments forthcoming. Happy skiing eveyone!
Need to look at 7S calendar. Also reducing hours
Looks like they will only be open Friday through Sunday until Christmas week, and the same beginning mid March
Confirmed with a buddy of mine that staff being onboarded for the winter at HV were told no Monday hours except for holidays.
So why the about face? Not good for pass sales maybe?
As for the long term, I too agree that in the foreseeable future LM and in time HV will become expendable from the Vail portfolio perspective.
HVdad wrote:
It's likely only at the rumor stage, but word on the street is that Vail Resorts, Inc. will be limiting skiing this year to the weekend at Laurel Mountain, and Hidden Valley will be shuttered on Mondays. Can't argue with accountants from a business perspective. That said, given the prevailing economic conditions, my guess is that they'll close Laurel in the 24/25 season, and Hidden Valley will be mothballed a year or two after that. No investments forthcoming. Happy skiing eveyone!
Not sure how some of these rumors get started, but these are the 2023-2024 winter regular season hours of operation planned for the resorts mentioned in this thread:
Hidden Valley: Monday-Wednesday: 10 a.m. - 4 p.m.; Thursday-Friday: 10 a.m. - 9 p.m.; Saturday: 9 a.m. - 9 p.m.; Sunday: 9 a.m. - 7 p.m.
Laurel Mountain: Monday: Closed; Tuesday-Thursday: 12 p.m. - 8 p.m.; Friday: 10 a.m. - 9 p.m.; Saturday: 9 a.m. - 9 p.m.; Sunday: 9 a.m. - 7 p.m.
Seven Springs: Monday-Friday: 9 a.m. - 9 p.m.; Saturday-Sunday: 8 a.m. - 9 p.m.
Hours may differ during holiday periods or if conditions/crowd levels warrant.
Laurel Mountain will be closed Mondays (although open on the Mondays of December 25, January 1, January 15, and February 19). Otherwise, all of these resorts plan to be open 7 days a week during the regular season.
I have heard absolutely no indication that Vail Resorts has any plans to shut down any of their Pennsylvania properties. Vail Resorts plans to announce its full 2024 capital investment plan in December, 2023.
Scott - if you went on their websites, and went to the lift ticket purchase function, went to the calendar, it showed that HV was closed on Monday and LM was closed Monday - Thursday for the season, except Holidays.. So it may have started as a rumor but the rumor seemed to be confirmed by Vail's websites for HV and LM. After the firestorm this created, they changed the operating days on the lift ticket purchase function back to what they were last year. So this is Vail's fault, regardless if the calendars were in error or intentional. i am glad the issue has been resolved, positively and we can move on.
Scott wrote:
Not sure how some of these rumors get started, but these are the 2023-2024 winter regular season hours of operation planned for the resorts mentioned in this thread:
Hidden Valley: Monday-Wednesday: 10 a.m. - 4 p.m.; Thursday-Friday: 10 a.m. - 9 p.m.; Saturday: 9 a.m. - 9 p.m.; Sunday: 9 a.m. - 7 p.m.
Laurel Mountain: Monday: Closed; Tuesday-Thursday: 12 p.m. - 8 p.m.; Friday: 10 a.m. - 9 p.m.; Saturday: 9 a.m. - 9 p.m.; Sunday: 9 a.m. - 7 p.m.
Seven Springs: Monday-Friday: 9 a.m. - 9 p.m.; Saturday-Sunday: 8 a.m. - 9 p.m.
Hours may differ during holiday periods or if conditions/crowd levels warrant.
Laurel Mountain will be closed Mondays (although open on the Mondays of December 25, January 1, January 15, and February 19). Otherwise, all of these resorts plan to be open 7 days a week during the regular season.
I have heard absolutely no indication that Vail Resorts has any plans to shut down any of their Pennsylvania properties. Vail Resorts plans to announce its full 2024 capital investment plan in December, 2023.
If you try to buy day tickets for Seven Springs, their website shows that that the resort is only open on weekends from Thanksgiving to Christmas week, and only open on weekends for the last two weeks of March. This would be a significant reduction in operating days from past years.
The driving factor is the cost of staff or lack of staff. The operating expenses for Vail were STAFF increase In pay. Many who worked in the industry are retired.
I manage by metrics not feelings. Not easy but no one can stay open losing money.
One way to see the future is where the capital improvements have taken place.
The other factor is food and booze sales
7S, Liberty, WT, JF, BB, RT makes sense near the most population centers. 3 of those 6 resorts have new lifts.
Time will tell.
Zardog
Truth.
ZARDOG wrote:
The driving factor is the cost of staff or lack of staff. The operating expenses for Vail were STAFF increase In pay. Many who worked in the industry are retired.
I manage by metrics not feelings. Not easy but no one can stay open losing money.
One way to see the future is where the capital improvements have taken place.
The other factor is food and booze sales
7S, Liberty, WT, JF, BB, RT makes sense near the most population centers. 3 of those 6 resorts have new lifts.
Time will tell.
Zardog
MitchSH wrote:
If you try to buy day tickets for Seven Springs, their website shows that that the resort is only open on weekends from Thanksgiving to Christmas week, and only open on weekends for the last two weeks of March. This would be a significant reduction in operating days from past years.
The other way to interpret the lack of day tickets on other weekends is that they will decide later how many tickets to make available later. Meaning 7Springs will be open on weekends, but mainly for Epic pass holders.
Marc , Hey, I do not know the flow of people in other areas like yours -- I do know MID Atlantic.
Correct. 80% own a pass. Weekends and holidays are the peak crush. Eric no pun.
Skiing participation was in a slow death before COVID-19. I have the surveys from USA and EU.
Historically pandemics caused fast change.
My other Sport (retired) has grown to a waitlist for competition. The sport has more expense with expendables.
(Action Shooting, 3-Gun) That sport went well with winter ski racing. I love speed and competition. technical and hands-on.
Also, check your large school systems many have off on Fridays and Mondays. My area. MD/NOVA has almost every weekend a 3 day.
I am blessed to wake up early, Ski 85% mid-week no crowds.
Manage by metrics.
IF vail is any good they know my profile.
Skis for 20+ years Income tripled.
25 days avg. Liberty Roundtop Wt. for top 3 visits
took off a year - must be injured, ah coming back from injury his visits are low but coming up to his average.
Most likely this season back to normal.
-------------------------------------------------
Data Science world
Zardog,
Yeah Dog Truth -
Snow sports is becoming more and more of a losing proposition dollar wise in the DMV. Akin to running a Gino's burger place back in the day in the Mid-Atlantic; too narrow-focused and no one wants it. Maybe someone can come up with a non-profit community-run ski hill like we have at Diamond Peak but I think Vail as any reasonably run biz will just scale down, take the P/L hit for tax reasons and eventually sell the near-worthless operations and perhaps profitable land for condos. Who can say? Liberty might just revert back to Ski Charnita? Have a little food truck near the golf course? Run it like an amusement park? Kill the back-side and ditch 50% of operations? It may be time to go back in history - maybe it all got too big and too corporate.
Crush I pay 26$ a day to ski Lib/RT/WT the price is fine. 20 days midweek no crowds.
I do not eat at the resort. I am Mr cheap.
48$ midweek for an epic day pass.
Vail and IKON did invest 2 billion in the industry and raised pay for staff.
My old sport 3-Gun is $100 min a day to play.
The hours of operation at Seven Springs, Hidden Valley, and Laurel Mountain have not been reduced, rolled back, truncated, or otherwise shortened for this season. I posted on the Support Laurel Mountain Facebook Group that hours would be reduced. On their official website, online pass purchases did not accept midweek payments at Laurel and Hidden Valley on non-holiday Mondays, seemingly verifying my usually credible source. Within 2 days, all three websites posted operating hours the same as last season.
Marketing starts in Sept. We are in mid-November.
Fun to see the updates at least now coming.
I see closing adjusted to the metrics of use. 12 hr days - no more 8 am to 10 pm (14 hr requires 2 shifts)
LMR Hours-
Skiing & Snowboarding
Monday - Tuesday: 9AM - 8PM
Wednesday - Thursday: 9AM - 9PM
Friday: 9AM - 10PM
Saturday: 8AM - 10PM
Sunday: 8AM - 8PM
Special Holiday Hours
Christmas Day 12/25: 8AM - 8PM
Christmas Week 12/26 - 12/28: 8AM - 9PM
New Years Weekend 12/29 - 12/31: 8AM - 10PM
New Years Day: 8AM - 8PM
MLK Day 01/15: 8AM - 8PM
President's Day 02/19: 8AM - 8PM
RMR
Lift Operational Hours for the Winter 2023-2024 Season:
Special Hours:
Whitetail ?????? nothing ---
Zardog
Bump to say, they might have kept hours largely the same, but they still suck.
Hidden Valley is still barely sort of half open. I wouldn't even call it that. On a holiday weekend they didn't really groom Saturday night into Sunday. On Sunday (which was the busiest day of the weekend because of the weather) one of the two triple lifts was non-functional all day. S__t happens, but maintenance and having competent people on hand helps to better deal with s__t. Lots of good slopes still aren't open. No terrain park to be found.
7S is better, but not much. As of Saturday I don't believe Gunnar lift was open. Not sure if anything changed Sunday.
Sorry. Rant over. I didn't believe the people who told me Vail would be worse than Nutting. But here we are.
I believe the marginal temperatures for snow making is mainly to blame, not Vail. The triple lifts are almost 50 years old. They're going to breakdown. Not sure about the grooming. But they are making snow everywhere today. Let's see where we are at the end of this very cold week.
Leo wrote:
Bump to say, they might have kept hours largely the same, but they still suck.
Hidden Valley is still barely sort of half open. I wouldn't even call it that. On a holiday weekend they didn't really groom Saturday night into Sunday. On Sunday (which was the busiest day of the weekend because of the weather) one of the two triple lifts was non-functional all day. S__t happens, but maintenance and having competent people on hand helps to better deal with s__t. Lots of good slopes still aren't open. No terrain park to be found.
7S is better, but not much. As of Saturday I don't believe Gunnar lift was open. Not sure if anything changed Sunday.
Sorry. Rant over. I didn't believe the people who told me Vail would be worse than Nutting. But here we are.
The temperatures up there have been far less marginal than the resorts close to DC. Yes it is 1-3 degrees warmer than Tline but only by a touch. A good comparison is Wisp which is ~70% open.
Honestly, I don't know why anyone would ski there w/o Gunnar open. The front side has almost no vertical and the North Face is likely a zoo. It is only when Gunnar and some of those trails are open that the place becomes fun and opens up.
snowsmith wrote:
I believe the marginal temperatures for snow making is mainly to blame, not Vail. The triple lifts are almost 50 years old. They're going to breakdown. Not sure about the grooming. But they are making snow everywhere today. Let's see where we are at the end of this very cold week.
Leo wrote:
Bump to say, they might have kept hours largely the same, but they still suck.
Hidden Valley is still barely sort of half open. I wouldn't even call it that. On a holiday weekend they didn't really groom Saturday night into Sunday. On Sunday (which was the busiest day of the weekend because of the weather) one of the two triple lifts was non-functional all day. S__t happens, but maintenance and having competent people on hand helps to better deal with s__t. Lots of good slopes still aren't open. No terrain park to be found.
7S is better, but not much. As of Saturday I don't believe Gunnar lift was open. Not sure if anything changed Sunday.
Sorry. Rant over. I didn't believe the people who told me Vail would be worse than Nutting. But here we are.
I honestly try to be patient. I don't just dislike Vail because it's easy to do. They have had plenty of snowmaking weather. Grooming on a holiday weekend should be a given. Keeping up with lifts, when you know they're 50 years old, should be a given. If you didn't want to invest in and run the resort, don't buy it. Around Christmas it was understandable that they were dealing with pretty tough weather. That doesn't hold water any more.
SKI-PSU wrote:
The temperatures up there have been far less marginal than the resorts close to DC. Yes it is 1-3 degrees warmer than Tline but only by a touch. A good comparison is Wisp which is ~70% open.
Honestly, I don't know why anyone would ski there w/o Gunnar open. The front side has almost no vertical and the North Face is likely a zoo. It is only when Gunnar and some of those trails are open that the place becomes fun and opens up.
snowsmith wrote:
I believe the marginal temperatures for snow making is mainly to blame, not Vail. The triple lifts are almost 50 years old. They're going to breakdown. Not sure about the grooming. But they are making snow everywhere today. Let's see where we are at the end of this very cold week.
Leo wrote:
Bump to say, they might have kept hours largely the same, but they still suck.
Hidden Valley is still barely sort of half open. I wouldn't even call it that. On a holiday weekend they didn't really groom Saturday night into Sunday. On Sunday (which was the busiest day of the weekend because of the weather) one of the two triple lifts was non-functional all day. S__t happens, but maintenance and having competent people on hand helps to better deal with s__t. Lots of good slopes still aren't open. No terrain park to be found.
7S is better, but not much. As of Saturday I don't believe Gunnar lift was open. Not sure if anything changed Sunday.
Sorry. Rant over. I didn't believe the people who told me Vail would be worse than Nutting. But here we are.
Have you seen the executive board and management team at Vail? They are your typical, know nothing about the product they sell but get some successes under the belt then move onto another company with those successes (even if they tank the company after they leave with the results of their decisions long term). Big stupid plastic smiles, posing with ski gear on they will never wear again in their life.
Vail wanted nothing to do with the property around 7Springs for growth. Not hotel growth, not parking lot growth, not terrain growth, NOTHING. Their entire goal is to sell as many passes as possible, set an operational expense budget for that specific resort for the year BEFORE the year starts, and let it go. Those that stay under budget while increasing revenue will capture bonuses and their big ugly plastic smiles will be on some internal win board memo.
This is what every corporation does.
Sometimes lowering operating costs results in decreased revenue, that's when they know they've bled the stone too much, time to dial it back.
Oh revenue is still decreasing and insight is that the customers arent happy with the product? Well, give them some table scraps a bit at a time and see if they come back.
But if revenue increases while ops costs stay flat or decrease, there will BE NO CHANGES TO WHAT THEY ARE DOING, if anything they will dilute the product even further until you vote with your money. (this is sadly the current state. While there are conversations happening about infrastructure upgrades, we are talking about deciding where those would be, how long they have at current state and getting those upgrades into the budget soon for maybe 5 years down the road?)
This is what people that were 'vailed' tried to warn us about. They treat it like a product. A bag of potato chips. Lower the quality, lower the quantity, increase the costs.
oddballstocks wrote:
I was at Seven Springs on Friday and Laurel on Monday. Night and day difference. Seven Springs seems to be calling it in, while Laurel is hitting on all cylinders.
Laurel had guns going on Innsbruck as well as a few connector trails. There were enormous whales. Snow Bowl was open, the woods skiable, upper Dream skiable, Laurel Run open etc. Innsbruck will be open once it's groomed down. If we get a few more inches of natural snow this week Dream Highway will be open as well.
Seven Springs had a bunch of closed terrain and no guns on. They don't even have Gunnar open yet, nothing blowing on that side.
The contrast is crazy. Seven Springs has snow making coverage for the entire mountain and they're about half open. Laurel has snow making for about half of the mountain and they're almost entirely open. With a few inches of fresh Laurel will be 100% open.
I've checked Hidden Valley a few times as well. They have snowmaking coverage for the entire mountain. Yet only Comet open on the North Summit?!?! With the number of fan guns they have on North Summit they could blanket the place in a day or less.
I'm mystified on HV and 7S. Seems like bad management. LM is doing it right this year, and people have noticed. It's been a lot more crowded, which is a really good thing!
Unfortunately yes... they're like a private equity firm. They want to suck all the money out, leave a husk and pat themselves on the back with cash the whole while.
The danger to their strategy is if they're hit with lackluster demand for a period of time (recession etc) they won't have anything else to fall back on such as real estate or golf. If they hit the skids and start to sell assets there aren't enough local operators to purchase these resorts anymore, they've all been acquired.
It's interesting to me that ski resorts are consolidating yet there aren't any large monopolies sucking up golf courses. It's similar dynamics, but golf courses have remained independent whereas ski resorts haven't. Obviously capex requirements are very different, but they're both seasonal activities that require a lot of land.
Grumpy dad wrote:
Have you seen the executive board and management team at Vail? They are your typical, know nothing about the product they sell but get some successes under the belt then move onto another company with those successes (even if they tank the company after they leave with the results of their decisions long term). Big stupid plastic smiles, posing with ski gear on they will never wear again in their life.
Vail wanted nothing to do with the property around 7Springs for growth. Not hotel growth, not parking lot growth, not terrain growth, NOTHING. Their entire goal is to sell as many passes as possible, set an operational expense budget for that specific resort for the year BEFORE the year starts, and let it go. Those that stay under budget while increasing revenue will capture bonuses and their big ugly plastic smiles will be on some internal win board memo.
This is what every corporation does.
Sometimes lowering operating costs results in decreased revenue, that's when they know they've bled the stone too much, time to dial it back.
Oh revenue is still decreasing and insight is that the customers arent happy with the product? Well, give them some table scraps a bit at a time and see if they come back.
But if revenue increases while ops costs stay flat or decrease, there will BE NO CHANGES TO WHAT THEY ARE DOING, if anything they will dilute the product even further until you vote with your money. (this is sadly the current state. While there are conversations happening about infrastructure upgrades, we are talking about deciding where those would be, how long they have at current state and getting those upgrades into the budget soon for maybe 5 years down the road?)
This is what people that were 'vailed' tried to warn us about. They treat it like a product. A bag of potato chips. Lower the quality, lower the quantity, increase the costs.
oddballstocks wrote:
I was at Seven Springs on Friday and Laurel on Monday. Night and day difference. Seven Springs seems to be calling it in, while Laurel is hitting on all cylinders.
Laurel had guns going on Innsbruck as well as a few connector trails. There were enormous whales. Snow Bowl was open, the woods skiable, upper Dream skiable, Laurel Run open etc. Innsbruck will be open once it's groomed down. If we get a few more inches of natural snow this week Dream Highway will be open as well.
Seven Springs had a bunch of closed terrain and no guns on. They don't even have Gunnar open yet, nothing blowing on that side.
The contrast is crazy. Seven Springs has snow making coverage for the entire mountain and they're about half open. Laurel has snow making for about half of the mountain and they're almost entirely open. With a few inches of fresh Laurel will be 100% open.
I've checked Hidden Valley a few times as well. They have snowmaking coverage for the entire mountain. Yet only Comet open on the North Summit?!?! With the number of fan guns they have on North Summit they could blanket the place in a day or less.
I'm mystified on HV and 7S. Seems like bad management. LM is doing it right this year, and people have noticed. It's been a lot more crowded, which is a really good thing!
oddballstocks wrote:
This is what people that were 'vailed' tried to warn us about. They treat it like a product. A bag of potato chips. Lower the quality, lower the quantity, increase the costs.
I see paper cuts all over the PA resorts; reduced hours, cut out Mondays, cut out weeknights, the cafe opens an hour later, closes an hour earlier. the other pubs/cafes not opened at all, the Liberty outdoor deck snack bar closed, the small North lodge bldg at HV closed, snowmaking down, fewer open trails. Everywhere a cut can be made.
The fact Gunnar still isn't open after a solid week of extremely good snowmaking weather s almost funny at this point. By this weekend, they will have almost enough natural base to open. I simply don't get the strategy
It's sad given pre-Timberline refresh and 7 Springs acquisition by Vail, 7 Springs was the best ski area within ~3 hours of DC
Sadly I think Grumpy Dad, in his grumpy way, more or less has the strategy nailed. Increase revenue, decrease expenses. The only other thing I would add is that they see MA resorts like 7S and HV as a way to feed vacationers to the western resorts. You ain't going somewhere else when you've already been forced to buy epic. But that's just part and parcel of the increased revenue side of the equation. And sadly, where I live, short of driving far Vail/Epic is my only choice, so the only way for me to vote with my dollars is to stop skiing.
SKI-PSU wrote:
The fact Gunnar still isn't open after a solid week of extremely good snowmaking weather s almost funny at this point. By this weekend, they will have almost enough natural base to open. I simply don't get the strategy
It's sad given pre-Timberline refresh and 7 Springs acquisition by Vail, 7 Springs was the best ski area within ~3 hours of DC
Yes, I would have to agree with the grumpy one as well. If Vail is sucessful with selling prepaid passes, then whats the point in going the extra mile to open terrain as fully or early as possible? That just adds to the expense collumn Its not like during the Buncher-Nutting ownership era where there was healthy competition between 7S & HV, as well as vs the other mid-atlantic resorts to attract day pass skiers. With so may PA resorts under their control, not like they are threatened by what TLine or Wisp might be doing.
At first I was excited to hear of the Vail purchase thinking that they would bring overdue investment and improvements to build the business, but now understand what it means to be Vailed.
Leo wrote:
Sadly I think Grumpy Dad, in his grumpy way, more or less has the strategy nailed. Increase revenue, decrease expenses. The only other thing I would add is that they see MA resorts like 7S and HV as a way to feed vacationers to the western resorts. You ain't going somewhere else when you've already been forced to buy epic. But that's just part and parcel of the increased revenue side of the equation. And sadly, where I live, short of driving far Vail/Epic is my only choice, so the only way for me to vote with my dollars is to stop skiing.
Has the tubing lodge been fixed at HV and are they tubing? It not, that'll be the second season now that they've done nothing to address it.
The Highlands GM already said 7S is the cash cow. It will get the investment, even if it's just seconds from the New England resorts (a la "upgraded" snow guns on Giant Steps that are still 90s/early 2000s era). They don't want anything taking away from it - which is why HV and especially Laurel will see little investment - probably mostly repairs and incremental upgrades if something has to be replaced.
That's why we'll never see the proposed expansion at HV that appears on some of the old maps. The GM said that those plans were made to make the resort more competitive with 7S. As that would take away from 7S, they have no plans to ever implement the expansion (or probably any expansion).
Thing is they're too dumb to see that investing in HV would allow them to have more people up in the area and are close enough to have shuttles. between them. Even Laurel's close enough to do that. Ski 3 good resorts on one pass over a weekend without ever having to get in your car? And each one with different flavors and unique offerings? How can they NOT invest in it?
Personally, I think 7S is overrated. There isn't that much difference between trails between Avalanche to Gunnar. Mainly length and some steepness variance. Straight down or the back and forth traverses. HV's and Laurel's runs at least feel different like you're not skiing the same thing every time.
Rant over.
Laurel Highlands wrote:
Yes, I would have to agree with the grumpy one as well. If Vail is sucessful with selling prepaid passes, then whats the point in going the extra mile to open terrain as fully or early as possible? That just adds to the expense collumn Its not like during the Buncher-Nutting ownership era where there was healthy competition between 7S & HV, as well as vs the other mid-atlantic resorts to attract day pass skiers. With so may PA resorts under their control, not like they are threatened by what TLine or Wisp might be doing.
At first I was excited to hear of the Vail purchase thinking that they would bring overdue investment and improvements to build the business, but now understand what it means to be Vailed.
Leo wrote:
Sadly I think Grumpy Dad, in his grumpy way, more or less has the strategy nailed. Increase revenue, decrease expenses. The only other thing I would add is that they see MA resorts like 7S and HV as a way to feed vacationers to the western resorts. You ain't going somewhere else when you've already been forced to buy epic. But that's just part and parcel of the increased revenue side of the equation. And sadly, where I live, short of driving far Vail/Epic is my only choice, so the only way for me to vote with my dollars is to stop skiing.
You covered a lot of ground there. But no, the tubing building at HV is not in use, and in fact, is essentially falling down. If an individual with no sway owned it (like me!) it would get condemned.
HV needs lift upgrades and terrain expansion. It could be an even better resort, easily.
LM needs more and better snowmaking and could be the best of the three with terrain expansion, but I really doubt the State (cough cough the Mellons) will ever allow that, or Vail have any interest in spending money there.
superguy wrote:
Has the tubing lodge been fixed at HV and are they tubing? It not, that'll be the second season now that they've done nothing to address it.
The Highlands GM already said 7S is the cash cow. It will get the investment, even if it's just seconds from the New England resorts (a la "upgraded" snow guns on Giant Steps that are still 90s/early 2000s era). They don't want anything taking away from it - which is why HV and especially Laurel will see little investment - probably mostly repairs and incremental upgrades if something has to be replaced.
That's why we'll never see the proposed expansion at HV that appears on some of the old maps. The GM said that those plans were made to make the resort more competitive with 7S. As that would take away from 7S, they have no plans to ever implement the expansion (or probably any expansion).
Thing is they're too dumb to see that investing in HV would allow them to have more people up in the area and are close enough to have shuttles. between them. Even Laurel's close enough to do that. Ski 3 good resorts on one pass over a weekend without ever having to get in your car? And each one with different flavors and unique offerings? How can they NOT invest in it?
Personally, I think 7S is overrated. There isn't that much difference between trails between Avalanche to Gunnar. Mainly length and some steepness variance. Straight down or the back and forth traverses. HV's and Laurel's runs at least feel different like you're not skiing the same thing every time.
Rant over.
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