Beaver, UT – Eagle Point ski area is slated to open this winter on the site of the former Elk Meadows Ski Resort east of Beaver, once again giving Utah its 14th ski and snowboard resort.nOfficials have spent the past month flooding online and print publications with postings for jobs ranging from ski patrol to customer service, signaling that ski operations will resume this winter high in Beaver Canyon.

The mountain’s new owners, private equity firm XE Capital Management, have quietly spent the summer reviving and recertifying ski lifts, clearing runs of overgrown brush and remodeling lodges.

Elk Meadows was one of only two ski areas in southern Utah, the other being Brian Head Resort, when it shut down in 2002. The owner at that time, Wayne Case of Portland, Ore., filed for bankruptcy protection and the ski area went dormant. Subsequent efforts to transform the property into an ultra-luxury, über-exclusive property to be called the Mt. Holly Club drew the ire of local residents and Elk Meadows homeowners alike. Those plans offered by Craig Burton, the president of Holladay, Utah-based CPB Development, ultimately failed amidst the current economic downturn, and CPB put the property on the Internet auction block in November 2009. XE Capital Management, which was actually involved in the development of the Mt. Holly Club, entered the $1.9 million winning bid.

For 25 years, Elk Meadows was a hidden stash in the Tushar Mountains west of Beaver for skiers and snowboarders looking to escape the crowds of Salt Lake City and Park City in northern Utah. However, its location — nearly four hours south of Salt Lake and a 90-minute drive past Brian Head for Las Vegas skiers — left the mountain with less than 20,000 skier visits annually in its later years.

The ski area has six fixed-grip lifts spanning 1,300 vertical feet. Lacking snowmaking, the resort relies entirely upon natural snowfall.