lotsoskiing
Any guesstimate on expense to make snow for, groom, and maintain an average-sized terrain park (3-400 vertical)? Just curious if most resorts see an attributable uptick in sales due to the expense. Or is it just a loss leader to get people there? Watching places put huge resources into getting them up and running and keeping them in shape made me wonder...
NewEnglandSkier13
Depends on the ski area. At BMOM we used to have a larger park, but the cost of maintaining it was not worth it. People never came to BMOM specifically to ski the park and a small park which does not require a dedicated park crew or large amounts of extra snowmaking to create makes much more sense for us. Plus, the jumps and other features in the woods are much more fun than a park could ever be.
joshua_segal
Thanks. lotsoskiing for asking the question. I've often wondered myself. I've yet to find anyone with hard answers but have heard the following arguments:
1. Parks are no longer just for snowboarders
2. Compared with racing programs, the park users pay retail
3. Parks take demand off lift systems, so they increase revenues without requiring additional lifts.
Again, no hard numbers and if anyone has some, I suspect many of us would be interested.
NewEnglandSkier13
Terrain parks also seem to be decreasing in popularity, at least around here, as other aspects of skiing such as backcountry and skinning increase in popularity. Besides BMOM, Hermon Mountain, Baker Mountain, and Mount Abram have also significantly decreased their park offerings in recent years. BMOM, Baker, and Hermon all have excavated half pipes which are no longer maintained as such.
Treilly
Here in Michigan parks are a big deal. It’s one way to make a 200’-300’ hill fun for a lot of people. At lot of places have a separate tow rope just for the park
newpylong
Certainly no decrease in usage around here. Boo.
w_skier
Used to post on SJ 1.0 when I was younger, and still browse this site occasionally, but figured I'd hop in on this discussion as it's in my area of expertise having worked in parks both large and small (including at BMOM funny enough)
Basically the only cost that carries across the industry for parks is Snowmaking; depends a lot on the topography of the park but a medium park with a few 20'-30' jumps would need about 2-3x the snow as the trail would need just left flat. A very rail oriented park could get away with less, maybe only 1.5x the snowmaking, less if snow is placed strategically. Superpipes and jumps over 40' obviously require a lot more, but larger resorts are moving towards earthwork to minimize that. (plus 18' halfpipes are basically dead at this point, even to the park riders)
Beyond snowmaking though it varies heavily on who's running the operation; you can do a lot with very few resources. Titcomb is a good example, they usually have a very good park built mostly by volunteers from UMF who ride park frequently and have a good grasp of the trends in how features are setup. The trouble with a lot of smaller hills is finding someone who fits the 1-man-ops-department role to lead the park; it's still a young industry and a lot of enthusiastic/experienced park guys don't have the grooming/snowmaking/lift knowledge to hold down operations at a small hill (and if they do have all that they're probably gonna end up at a bigger resort), meanwhile the older guys who have all that Mtn Ops knowledge often aren't super interested in the park and the end result is half-assed at best and a liability at worst. On top of that once you have the park it needs to be marketed, which can be done successfully and cheaply on social media, but again requires some enthusiasm and knowledge.
I was at Black Mtn 2016-2018 and our budget was mostly paying 40-50 man hours a week, plus about $500 in materials for building some new rails in 2017. For 2017-2018 we had a very competitive setup as far as Maine goes with ~8 rails and 1 jump, but it was a struggle to get the cat operators to groom the park every week (something that should really be done daily for safety reasons) and it felt like we weren't really taken seriously. Having more knowledge now (specifically how to operate a cat) I feel like I could do more but I left after that season to work full time at Sugarloaf.
As far as industry trends go the saying "Build it and They Will Come" applies, but it takes a few years especially if word of mouth is the only marketing. Park kids are fickle though, if it isn't done right and stuff is sketchy they won't bother and it's all a waste. That said there's no reason every small hill can't have at least a flat rail and a box that get raked and groomed daily. One of my goals is to use the resources I have at Sugarloaf to try and help the smaller hills in the area like Baker and Hermon with their park programs. As hinted at above for younger people parks are what draws them to the sport, hiking some rails with their friends in highschool is what's going to get them hooked and bringing their own kids back in 20 years.
tl;dr: You can get a good bang for your buck with a knowledgeable park director, but the knowledge is scarce (for now) and a lot of places aren't really looking for it either.
Griffinr04061
Interesting discussion. As we near February, I have been puzzled by the lack of parks and features at a few mountains we ski at with our Epic pass. My sons are 16 and 18, and always in search of the terrain parks. They have been disappointed that both Attitash and Sunapee seem to have put little effort into their parks this year. They have been going over to Crotched more this season as they always seem to get their parks ready to go early in the season. I have been wondering if price has been a factor in some mountains holding back this year.
w_skier
Don't know much about Vail's operations but they have a history of removing those leading successful parks at resorts they acquire, specifically Park City a few years back and Mt Snow/Big Boulder this year. Parks seem to be rather low on their priority list, which is a shame IMO given their potential to renew youth interest in the sport. This winter has been tough for parks everywhere though, snowmaking has been needed elsewhere to expand open terrain and once that budget dries up it would take some convincing to run again on some of the most expensive trails.
