MAKE TAHOE DEEP AGAIN ~ 2016/17 OFISHUL SNOW/FOOD/WHINE & STOKE THREAD

[P-ville Madman]

Saddle and Vista laps were ridiculously fun today at the Wood! Had to hike for Vista. No tbar yet. Love dropping a knee and not being able to see for a moment. Vista is just plastered...so much in play that normally isn't for my old ass. 99 steps was good for some more fresh later in the day. Man, so fun[emoji108]

[hercule33]

Do you think mass outcry to get stuff open faster after (or during) storms is going to make things safer for patrollers?

Quite frankly that is the wrong question to ask. No one is demanding the mountains to open faster with disregard for patrollers. People are complaining that after KSL took over the mountain operations suck for both customers and patrollers.

For me what is most disconcerting is that KSL thus far has not publicly admitted that there is a problem. If they did admit they have a problem and outlined how they are going to fix it, I think most people would be far more patient and understanding. Instead KSL is pretending like everything is OK, has told its customers to stop complaining and is wondering why their customers are pissed off.

[powpig]

I'm told KSL sold 40,000 passes this season. They are truly laughing all the way to the bank. About the only way Squaw could be run any worse is if Jed York bought the place.

[emcee]

one run from Kirkwood last monday when we got snowed in on both sides, the "fun sandwich."

[TahoeJ]

^^ Nice.

So, I took this picture 2 weeks ago - 2 full weeks ago - while touring in Shirley Canyon. That would be Silverado in the far distance covered by a shit load of snow. They were doing control work that afternoon but as we all know it never opened despite 4 more days of sunshine after this. Most other resorts employ enough workers to open that up. You're telling me a Vail run resort doesn't have that open in a day or two? Of course they would. This was MLK weekend and there were long lines all over the place. What a joke.

[stanmarsh]

Which vail resort is opening terrain equivalent to Silverado a day or two after a 7 foot snowstorm? Serious question.

[4matic]

I've been reading through KSL press releases. I can't see that they've ever made money. The Whistler deal looks like a cash raise.

[hercule33]

^^ Nice.

So, I took this picture 2 weeks ago - 2 full weeks ago - while touring in Shirley Canyon. That would be Silverado in the far distance covered by a shit load of snow. They were doing control work that afternoon but as we all know it never opened despite 4 more days of sunshine after this. Most other resorts employ enough workers to open that up. You're telling me a Vail run resort doesn't have that open in a day or two? Of course they would. This was MLK weekend and there were long lines all over the place. What a joke.

Even Sugar Bowl, a resort considered by most to be less "world class" than Squaw, manages to open terrain faster. Pathetic.

What's the point of getting a Squaw/Alpine pass if they can't open expert terrain in a competitive manner?

[esseff]

KSL makes me nostalgic for the old days with Cushing and the "We Care" slogan.

He was a crusty, tight 'ol bastard but he could get a mountain open. I've seen many bigger winters there and his crew always got stuff open. Why? Money, locals and no need for a 'corporate safety officer.'

I'm told KSL sold 40,000 passes this season. They are truly laughing all the way to the bank. About the only way Squaw could be run any worse is if Jed York bought the place.

Now that is funny!

I watched undercover boss and other appearances. Wirth comes off as smarmy. That's ok if this were a family business but it isn't. This is private equity.
KSL should sell.

Dream on. Won't happen. The LP's still have their hands out. No payoff until the development rights are sold. After that, who knows.

What I have come to understand in the past few years, comparing Squaw of today vs. Squaw of Alex and visiting other ski areas is that KSL simply is a very poor operator. Running a safe, efficient mountain is about OPERATIONS. I don't think they understand this. This goes beyond actual mountain ops, it goes down to road crews, flagmen (or women), etc. I've experienced Squaw road crews trying to clear SV Road AT 8:30 IN THE EFFING MORNING on a pow day. I've seen them set the cones at 8:45 ON A WEEKEND.

Maybe they are cheap (well, we know that), maybe after the incorporation battle they don't care about their customers anymore, maybe they don't have an experienced ops exec, maybe all of the above.

Today was one of those days at Squaw where you just ski your ass off with a huge grin; HW laps moving south: face, slot, LT, C2... not even wanting to stop to take a piss in a tree well. Its a magical place, just sucks that we can't fully enjoy its potential (which ain't too tough to achieve).

[neufox47]

I'm told KSL sold 40,000 passes this season. They are truly laughing all the way to the bank. About the only way Squaw could be run any worse is if Jed York bought the place.

40k passes at an average of $750 is $30 million. That is a good chunk of cash but not close to covering operations costs. I have no idea if they are profitable or not (this year Id guess yes, last year probably, the 4 before that no). Just saying 40k passes doesnt get them far.

My guess is that operations got whittled down over the drought, now they get hit with huge snow.

The amount of time it took to get stuff going, including lifts after the terrain opened did seem crazy.

[TahoeJ]

Which vail resort is opening terrain equivalent to Silverado a day or two after a 7 foot snowstorm? Serious question.

Kirkwood has been doing a hell of a lot better at getting terrain open than Squaw. Sure, not the same as your silvy comparison request, but it's a similar comparison with legit terrain. And that's the red-headed step child of their resorts, not their prize and primary focus. Regardless, they would employ enough staff to make things run smoothly. Case in point a few years back when Squaw was complaining about an employee shortage (more fucking excuses) while Northstar and Heavenly had plenty of staff to go around once it finally started snowing - because KSL cut bait on too many workers after the season got off to a slow start, worrying more about every dime they could save than running a world class mountain.

[hercule33]

Which vail resort is opening terrain equivalent to Silverado a day or two after a 7 foot snowstorm? Serious question.

Kirkwood for one. I took an avalanche class at Kirkwood and the instructor said that almost every run at Kirkwood is an avalanche path. Seriously if Kirkwood can open the mountain when 88 is closed due to avalanche danger, KSL has no excuses.

[gnarbro365]

There is a ton of pressure on patrollers from management and public to get terrain open...hopefully that sense of urgency was not a main contributing factor.

Ya'll back to hating on KSL two days after one of their patrollers died in a horrific accident.


Are you guys essentially blaming KSL for the accident?

[mattyj]

Checked that box two years ago.

Edit to add: part of me feels like an ass for posting any kind of snark so soon after a tragedy like this, but it's hard to silently watch Squaw blatantly conflate legitimate criticism of their mountain management with criticism of their line level employees, and use this tragedy as a rebuttal of the former.

[Fish Rider]

Saddle and Vista laps were ridiculously fun today at the Wood! Had to hike for Vista. No tbar yet. Love dropping a knee and not being able to see for a moment. Vista is just plastered...so much in play that normally isn't for my old ass. 99 steps was good for some more fresh later in the day. Man, so fun[emoji108]

99 steps felt like 299 steps Vista was amazing

Saddle and Vista laps were ridiculously fun today at the Wood! Had to hike for Vista. No tbar yet. Love dropping a knee and not being able to see for a moment. Vista is just plastered...so much in play that normally isn't for my old ass. 99 steps was good for some more fresh later in the day. Man, so fun[emoji108]

99 steps felt like 299 steps Vista was amazing

[4matic]

Checked that box two years ago.

Edit to add: part of me feels like an ass for posting any kind of snark so soon after a tragedy like this, but it's hard to silently watch Squaw blatantly conflate legitimate criticism of their mountain management with criticism of their line level employees, and use this tragedy as a rebuttal of the former.

Does he mean the short history of KSL or the entirety of Squaw history?

[hercule33]

Ya'll back to hating on KSL two days after one of their patrollers died in a horrific accident.


Are you guys essentially blaming KSL for the accident?

I cant speak for others but I am not blaming KSL for the accident because I have not seen enough evidence to suggest that they are to blame. That being said, I would not be shocked if the investigation would place some of the blame on KSL.

I think the discussion has been about Squaw/Alpine not opening terrain as fast as other resorts. In my opinon, if KSL stopped giving BS excuses for the delays and said how they would fix them it would be much more effective than their "open letter."

[stanmarsh]

I'm not at all out to defend KSL. That facebook post was a dumb move. I also heard about the massive traffic jam caused by their snowplow at 830 am on a powder day. I've seen plenty of other similarly asinine moves. The village plan... don't even get me started. KSL sucks, I'm with you.

That said, it took Kirkwood until today to get the whole mountain open, and it's half the size of Squaw. So that's just bs to say that other resorts are getting terrain on the scale of silverado open in one day. I mean, come on.

Not to mention, tahoe just experienced the snowiest month in the history of skiing in tahoe (per BA). So the data seems to disagree with those saying they've seen bigger winters. And patrol took on a bunch of new hires this year, and is still actively hiring. It takes a season or two to get new patrollers fully productive.

Again, KSL sucks, but the last month has clearly been a massive challenge for mtn ops and patrol, and that's without even getting into this week. Squaw is a different beast than any other resort in Tahoe. So just hoping to inject a dose of reality so that these criticisms are getting directed where they belong. Hey, squaw was the only mountain in tahoe (N* doesn't count) loading lifts at 9am on sunday. Haven't heard that mentioned anywhere.

EDIT: can we get a new thread for this? think we've cunted this one up enough for now

[TahoeJ]

I think we've beaten this to death but I will just add that opening lifts and terrain involves a lot more people than just patrol.

Since when is Kirkwood half the size of Squaw?

Looked it up. Kirkwood 2300 acres, Squaw 3600 (which is misleading since Silverado barely counts since it's never open).

[stanmarsh]

I was using wikipedia (the gold standard of accurate internet sources) which gave me 4000 sq. ft. for squaw. I then rounded to get half. Whatever, kirkwood is a good deal smaller than squaw, point still stands.

[hercule33]

Who cares how big a resort is? Now that Squaw and Alpine are one resort does that give KSL twice as much time to open them both?

My point is not that Silverado should be spinning at 9 AM after a 6 foot storm but that KSL could have done a much better job with mountain ops this year despite Squaw and Alpine having some of the toughest terrain to open in Tahoe. I think that everyone pretty much is on the same page on that statement so I agree it has been beaten to death.

[gnarbro365]

I with Stan, anymore KSL bitching should go to another thread. How many times can you say the same thing? Here...I'll even give you a thread title: "KSL sucks. They don't hire enough people."

On to more important things:

A memorial service will be held at Sierra Bible Church, 11460 Brockway Road, in Truckee on Friday, January 27, at 11 a.m.. Squaw Valley Ski Patrol will conduct a tribute sweep at the resort at 4:30 p.m. that day as well.

[TahoeJ]

Agreed. Moving on. When your kid refuses to go skiing and won't even take you up on your bribes, you end up doing desperate things like this...

[old goat]

Understood... But to be fair, Squaw terrain is pretty complex and I'm sure that it's not easy to "staff up" and "staff down" based on snow conditions. It's not like there's a "bench" that they can pull from to get on the mountain and actually be knowledgeable, safe, and efficient... Or for that matter, that actually wants to do it for whatever is being paid.

I don't know. Definitely have no love for Squaw and $15 sandwiches but not sure they're manipulating openings and closures to the tune of whatever beancounter's spreadsheet.

Do you think mass outcry to get stuff open faster after (or during) storms is going to make things safer for patrollers?

I cant speak for others but I am not blaming KSL for the accident because I have not seen enough evidence to suggest that they are to blame. That being said, I would not be shocked if the investigation would place some of the blame on KSL.

I think the discussion has been about Squaw/Alpine not opening terrain as fast as other resorts. In my opinon, if KSL stopped giving BS excuses for the delays and said how they would fix them it would be much more effective than their "open letter."

It's not just how many patrollers, lift ops, mechanics, etc you hire. It's how many you call in and what time you have them there, how many routes you run, how long do you keep running routes. How many times have you been on the lower mountain when the upper mountain was closed for snow safety and not heard any bombs during the day? When my son was on patrol (pre KSL) there were 55 on patrol, but not nearly all of them were called in to do snow safety. I'm sure it's the same situation with lift ops. As far as mechanics--I can't remember seeing so many lifts on mechanical hold as this year--and that goes back to before the big storms.

I don't think there's any reason at this point to blame KSL for a hand charge going off prematurely. I also doubt we'll ever hear the reason. KSL does like to play things close to the vest; they seem not to realize that in the absence of information people speculate and spread rumors.

One more example of bad operations--on the morning of the tragedy with cars backing up on AM road, there was a sign that said something about parking--the sign was mostly buried--no cars parked in the lower lot, no one down there directing traffic. Just before I got to the main lot they started turning cars around. By the time I had inched my way back to the lower lot--on the unplowed road--that lot was filled, but cars were still heading up AM road. And there was still no one managing traffic. Yes, there was a tragedy that day, at Squaw, but that doesn't mean KSL can just stop caring about their customers--all of whom that I saw were keeping their cool, understanding that something bad must have happened at Squaw to suddenly close the mountain.

KSL has no experience operating a ski area--all it's other properties are beach and golf type resorts. They clearly have no understanding of the boom/bust nature of the ski business or of the challenges of operating in a harsh environement, and they clearly had no understanding of what kind of mountains they bought.

[2_1_3]

Nooooooooooo!!!!!! Curse you, o Wicked Wind of the East!

Or does this mean that certain runs of a most irie nature should be outrageous windbuff today?!