Poor Lift Planning at Alta

[ChrisC]

Alta has made strange lift installation choices over the years, often paying 2x for a lift. Could have afforded a Wildcat replacement or a lift to Solitude.


1. Sunny Side High-speed Triple

This lift barely lasted 20 years. Why did they install a triple? It's just weird and short-sighted. And they still kept the Albion lift around. It should have always been an HS Quad.

Sunnyside – Alta, UT

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2. Supreme Lift High-speed Quad

It already needs replacing due to wear on chairs, grips, and towers.

Alta Plans to Rebuild Supreme Lift

The experiment to build a detachable quad with an eight degree turn and no angle station may be coming to an end. This week Alta Ski Area General Manager Mike Maughan revealed the Supreme lift is s…

liftblog.com

Alta Plans to Rebuild Supreme Lift
June 22, 2024 Peter Landsman

The experiment to build a detachable quad with an eight degree turn and no angle station may be coming to an end. This week Alta Ski Area General Manager Mike Maughan revealed the Supreme lift is suffering from accelerated metal fatigue, requiring the ski area to look at major modifications. Specifically the lift’s chairs have become damaged over time as they pass through numerous canted sheave assemblies. “Every one of those [chair pans] is cracked significantly,” Maughan told the Alta Town Council Thursday. “An investigation by engineers said we’re accelerating fatigue on the chairs, the grips and the bend itself.”


Supreme was constructed in 2017 to replace two separate lifts – Cecret and Supreme – which ran consecutively in different alignments. A new high speed quad was envisioned to include an angle station near the top of the old Cecret chair where beginners could unload. Chairs would detach, turn and continue to the Supreme summit. That plan proved expensive so Alta pivoted to a unique bend design that kept chairs moving at full speed through a line turn. By following both old lift lines with a bend, Alta would cut fewer trees and avoid significant ground disturbance. Doppelmayr reportedly declined to bid on the bend design and would only supply the lift with an angle station (like they did on nearby Collins.) Alta went ahead with Leitner-Poma and the new Supreme opened for the 2017-18 season. From the beginning skiers noticed the ride through the bend was quite bumpy and jarring. Last winter, Alta experimented with a different Leitner chair design in an attempt to mitigate the rough ride through the bend.


Fast forward to today and Alta sees two possible paths forward. The first is to rebuild the lift in a straight path between the top and bottom terminals. This would require every tower and terminal foundation to be replaced. “All the equipment would be re-used with maybe a few new towers added to the mix,” said Maughan. A second, less likely option is to keep both terminals in place and build a full angle station where the bend stands today. Analysis is underway to determine the best solution. “We approached the Forest Service and they are open to the realignment approach which would end up with a simpler lift with fewer moving parts and less wear and tear,” noted Maughan. Either way, the project will be a major undertaking targeted for summer 2025. “We’re waiting for numbers back from Poma to understand the cost of both options.”


For the upcoming 2024-25 season, the lift is expected to continue operating with chairs either repaired or replaced as necessary. It’s important to remember Supreme has operated safely for seven years and thorough inspections caught the issue before any incident. Now that the problem is known, Alta will work closely with the Forest Service, Leitner-Poma and the Utah Passenger Ropeway Safety Committee on safe interim and long term solutions.

 

[EMSC]

I can say, I'm glad I got to ride the current bizzaro configuration for Supreme lift. Just out of curiosity for interesting lift configurations. That said, I absolutely hate the horridly jarring nature of that mid-way turn. That's a lot of vibration and short, but high G forces on all that gear, so not overly surprised that it didn't last very long.

 

[ChrisC]

Doppelmayr would not even bid on the installation.

Moonlight Basin’s (newly departed) 6 pack was not a straight line - more like a 5 degree angle. That lift had a very low capacity - 1800 persons/hr. Hopefully the new heated, covered 8-pack corrects things.

 

[jimk]

Another weird thing Alta did was installing those nutcracker safety bars. I believe they preferred nothing, but had to install bars to comply with some legal decision involving an injured guest. But why no foot rests? I'm a religious user of safety bars, equally for safety and for resting my feet/legs.

 

[MarzNC]

Another weird thing Alta did was installing those nutcracker safety bars. I believe they preferred nothing, but had to install bars to comply with some legal decision involving an injured guest. But why no foot rests? I'm a religious user of safety bars, equally for safety and for resting my feet/legs.

The goal was to keep children from sliding out underneath the safety bar. Footrests would've added cost and weight.

The safety bar style on Supreme seems to be a standard these days. Can't remember exactly where, but I've seen them at other resorts out west in recent years. A bit easier to deal with than the older style on Collins since they "posts" don't go down as far.

From my experience in the since safety bars were added at Alta, locals and regulars don't bother to put them down. At least by now most don't complain if someone wants to put down the safety bar. When they were new, I had a mother absolutely have a fit when I put down the safety bar after asking nicely. She was with a boy, perhaps 7 or 8, hard to say if he was her son or grandson. She glared at me and said "I hope you didn't put down the bar for him <pointing to the boy>." Then she sulked the entire ride up Collins. The boy seemed embarrassed.

I know people who won't ride Wildcat because there is no safety bar. Since that's advanced terrain (mostly), there is clearly no rush to replace Wildcat just to get safety bars in place. A replacement lift is part of the current Master Plan but there is no timeline.

 

[MarzNC]

Alta wanted an angle station with mid-station unloading for beginners. But the area where that would need to go was considered too sensitive. Almost like wetlands during the summer as I remember.

Alta instructors were sorry to lose the beginner terrain that had been accessed by Cecret. I noticed that the gate to access Cabin Hill and Devil's Playground off Rock 'N Roll was in a different location for 2023-24 . The change makes it a bit easier to take an adventurous advanced beginner or intermediate to Devil's Playground. Going through that gate is the way to access a trail that used to be off Cecret. It's still groomed regularly.