Top Five Fridays: July 5, 2024
Lead Image: A look at Maine’s Mt. Abram, one of 10 independent ski areas that joined the Indy Pass this week. Image: Mt. Abram on Facebook
#1: NOAA Predicting at Another La Niña Winter - The Fifth Atypical Winter in a Row:
Bust out the pen and paper everyone, it’s time to (re)learn about the ENSO effect!
Hello, and welcome to Top Five Fridays, the July 5th, 2024 edition! As luck would have it, we have a particularly independent recap for you this week, coincidentally coming just one day after our own Independence Day. We’ll get into those well timed highlights shortly, but before we do, we want to start with one of the most polarizing summer highlights: earlier weather predictions for the coming winter.
This week, we caught an article from Powder Magazine that shared the news that the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) is predicting another round of La Niña in the year ahead. We’ll let the accompanying video do the heavy lifting as far as explaining what exactly La Niña and El Niño are, but the ultra short version of it is that it’s a weather pattern that sets up in early winter and dictates the jetstream’s trajectory over North America. That jetstream is largely responsible for determining how much moisture is brought onto the continent, as well as the air temperature. Cool, so what does it all mean?
Well, there’s two trains of thought that we can take here. First, according to science and weather models, La Niña typically results in colder, wetter weather on the west coast, and particularly in the Pacific Northwest. The other way to interpret the news is by looking back at recent history, which paints a slightly more complex picture. If you recall, last year was classified as an El Niño season, which was marked by a mild start to the winter just about everywhere in North America. The three years prior to that however, were all La Niña winters, in what was considered a rare “triple dip” event. What makes that period so interesting to us, is that the first two La Niña winters were relatively mild, producing far less snow than one would expect from the weather pattern. The third iteration though, depending on where you were, was not at all a flop, and featured record breaking snowfall. That year, the 2022-2023 season, was the year of the atmospheric river, in which the jetstream locked in over parts of California, Utah, and Colorado, and delivered seemingly endless powder days. In other words, while science is able to suggest typical outcomes for these weather patterns, actual results are far from guaranteed and can vary widely.
For us on the East Coast, it’s even more challenging to predict the impacts of, as our weather ultimately depends on how far south the jetstream dips. Regardless of which pattern we see, the bottom line is that we want the jetstream to remain to our south so that we’re getting colder air from the north. This can happen in both La Niña and El Niño years, and when we look back across the past four years, there isn’t a significant difference in the quality of those seasons. While each one served up incredible powder days, particularly in March, they also each offered challenging days as rainfall in December and January reduced promising snowpacks to nearly nothing.
While we’re big believers in science over here on Top 5 Fridays, and have no doubt at all that conditions exist that suggest another La Niña winter, we can’t help but feel like this news ultimately doesn’t bring any clarity as to what lies ahead. As we saw in the recent triple dip, La Niña could ultimately have very little impact, or it could bring record amounts of snow. Even still, if another atmospheric river does form this year, it’s not guaranteed that it’ll set up in the same location. Additionally, the other question that this week’s news raises is, “are El Niño and La Niña even significant anymore?” According to NOAA, La Niña generally occurs every 3-5 years, although sometimes can last longer. El Niño is slightly more common, occurring every 2-7 years, also occasionally lasting longer. Including the forecast for this season though, this will be the fifth consecutive winter seeing one of these two weather patterns. It’s worth noting that both of these patterns can occasionally occur for more than a year, but we still can’t help but wonder if we’ll ever see a “normal” winter again. For us on the East Coast, where these weather patterns seem to bring back and forth winters, we’d at least like a brief return to normalcy, if only to see if it would make a difference. Alas, we’ll have to wait another year. For now, check out the La Niña news from Powder.com or NOAA itself.
#2: Doppelmayr Ropeways Announces Plans to Double the Size of U.S. Headquarters and Manufacturing Facility in Salt Lake City:
A conceptual rendering of the newly announced Dopplemayr headquarters, expected to be operational by mid 2026. Image: Dopplemayr's Press Release
Next up in ski news this week is a highlight from the world of chairlifts, albeit with a bit of a twist. This week, Doppelmayr announced plans to double the size of their U.S. headquarters in Salt Lake City with the development of a new facility. In the words of President of Doppelmayr USA, Katharina Schmitz, “The current facility has served us well for over 20 years, but we are bursting at the seams.” Citing the significant investments in infrastructure being made at ski resorts across the country, Dopplemayr finds itself in need of constructing a new, massive, state of the art manufacturing facility. When all is said and done, the new headquarters will be over 220,000 square feet, with 120,000 of that being dedicated to indoor production and warehousing, 68,000 square feet being covered outdoor space, and 40,000 square feet dedicated to office space and a training facility.
Zooming out from this story a bit, there’s plenty of exciting concepts at play. First and foremost, is the recognition that in addition to significant investments in new chairlifts across the U.S., a charge being led by Vail and Alterra first and foremost, is the fact that there are a number of projects happening right in Dopplemayr’s own backyard. Just to the north of Salt Lake City, Powder Mountain has just received approval for two of their five newly planned chairlifts. Between Powder Mountain and the Dopplemayr headquarters, Wasatch Peaks Ranch - the ultra exclusive ski resort being planned for the 1% of the 1%, is still in the early stages of building their resort and will require plenty of help manufacturing and implementing chairlifts. As we know, Deer Valley just got the greenlight to double in size, requiring several new lifts. And then, of course, is the highly controversial Little Cottonwood Canyon gondola project, which would provide a massive contract should it ever come to fruition. Now, just to be clear, we’re not saying that all of these projects will absolutely involve Dopplemayr, but building a massive manufacturing plant in close proximity to all of them seems to be an advantageous move at the very least.
The other aspect that we like about this story is simply the fact that it’s going to create more jobs in a ski town. Now, we should probably clarify that “town” is a bit of a misnomer as the greater metropolitan area of Salt Lake City is home to approximately 1.2 million people, but the point remains. Of those 1.2 million people, a significant number are skiers and snowboarders, and while manufacturing chairlift cables isn’t the same as working in a ski shop, it’s not hard to imagine that this would create job opportunities for skiers and riders with engineering inclinations. Mix in a 40,000 square foot training facility, and you’ve suddenly got the makings of a career path for someone interested working in either the chairlift or the ski resort industry. All in all, we just thought this was a really cool story to share this time of year, and one that gives some insight into a corner of the industry we don’t get to discuss particularly often. To learn more about this announcement, check out the press release, by way of SnowIndustryNews.com.
#3: Indy Pass Announces 10 New Resort Partners, Bringing Total Number to 200+:
At Nova Scotia’s Cape Smokey, you can ride Atlantic Canada’s only gondola while taking in breathtaking views of the Atlantic Ocean. Image: Cape Smokey on Facebook
Alright, onto the independent news we promised you! First up in that doubleheader is the news that the Indy Pass has once again expanded its roster, adding 10 new resorts to the lineup. At this point, we’d love to tell you exactly how many resorts are a part of the Indy Pass, but it appears as though they’ve lost track themselves, now simply advertising a simplified number of “200+”. Regardless of an exact number, this week’s news brings the pass program to over the 200 resorts they promised back in the spring, making them easily one of the best deals in skiing. Now, with the additional resorts, pass holders can ski for two days at each of the over 200 independent ski areas worldwide, providing a theoretical 400 days of skiing for as little as $379. While it’s likely not the right pass product for skiers who prefer a specific home mountain, it does make a ton of sense for those without a strong allegiance or proximity to any particular resort, and who are interested in sampling an array of ski areas each season.
As for the resorts that just joined the pass? As it turns out, they’re primarily focused in two regions: New England and Japan. Here in New England, Middlebury Snowbowl in Vermont, Mt. Abram and Camden Snow Bowl in Maine, and Ragged Mountain in New Hampshire have all joined the pass. In addition to these great small New England Ski Areas, the pass also added Hatley Pointe in North Carolina to bolster its selection of U.S. based resorts. From here, the intrigue grows as the pass has also added Nova Scotia’s Cape Smokey ski area, home to Atlantic Canada’s only gondola. While we’ve never heard of this particular ski area, initial research suggests that it’s incredibly picturesque and a beautiful place to ski. Also joining the list of international ski destinations are four more Japanese areas: Anihari, Maiko, Nayoro Piyashiri, and Palcall Tsumagoi Ski Resorts. Again, while we lack familiarity with these resorts, a quick Google suggests that each would provide at least two days of fun, with the terrain parks at Palcall Tsumagoi being particularly appealing.
Unfortunately, this highlight does come with a quick caveat: the Indy Pass is becoming increasingly difficult to purchase as immense interest forces them to only allow pass sales during brief windows of time. The good news though, is that at the time of this posting, the Indy Pass is currently available to purchase, although we suspect they’ll turn sales back off any day now. To learn more and to attempt to buy a pass, head over to their website.
#4: After Years of Being Passed Around Between Media Conglomerates, Newschoolers.com is Independent Once Again:
After years if being passed around by media conglomerates, freeskiing’s original online community, Newschoolers.com, has bought back its independence. Image: Newschoolers.com
Finally, for part two of our independence themed double header, we’re capping off this holiday week with a headline that I (Matt) know hits particularly close to home for myself and Jeff, as a staple of our childhoods has just shared some pretty big news: Newschoolers.com is independent once again. Now, you’ve likely heard of Newschoolers.com before, if only because we cite them quite often when recapping freeskiing competitions as they post incredibly descriptive coverage of each event. For freeskiers in the 30+ club, such as Jeff and I though, Newschoolers.com has an extra special place in our hearts as it was the online source of all things freeskiing during the early 2000’s; the decade in which the sport really began to take shape. In the days before rockered skis, when approximately five film companies produced one annual ski film, and the switch 1080 was the hardest trick in the world, Newschoolers.com was the online community where kids in rural Maine, New York, and every other corner of the world could log on after school and chat with pros, future pros, and industry professionals. Amongst Newschoolers.com “alumni” from this era are names like Tom Wallisch, Andy Parry, Ethan Stone (current owner of DownDays.eu), Matt Benedetto (Unnecessary Inventions), Matt Walker... the list goes on endlessly. The point is, Newschoolers.com was, and continues to be, a huge part of the freeskiing community.
And then, in 2007, the website was purchased by a company called The Enthusiast Network, a company that owned a number of other sports “media” companies, including Powder Magazine. From there, as you’ll recall, Powder Magazine and a number of other businesses, including Newschoolers.com, were acquired by a company called American Media Inc. in 2019, which later became known as accelerate360, or A360 for short. From there, once again, a large portfolio of publications including Newschoolers.com and Powder Magazine, as well as names like Men’s Journal and Men’s Fitness was acquired by yet another conglomerate, this time called Arena Group. In other words, through a series of purchases, Newschoolers.com, which was once an independent business, became lumped in with countless other media outlets under a parent organization that was blissfully unaware of concepts like bring-backs or controversies surrounding poles at Big Air events. That is, until very recently.
Last week, Newschoolers.com announced that it has regained its independence. In classic Newschoolers style, the news was announced by way of a post that didn’t take itself particularly seriously. Rather than dive into the details like we just did, the announcement on Newschoolers is one part humorous first person retelling of the re-acquisition, and one part celebration of a return to the company’s roots. Along with the announcement also came news that longtime stewards of the company are either remaining at the helm or are back on board, with the new management team consisting of David Zorko, Mr Bishop, Adam Spensley, and Paul Stanisci. Now that the organization is independent once again, it’ll be both interesting and exciting to see what lies ahead at a time when the sport is as healthy as it’s ever been, with plenty of opportunity for growth thanks to the recent announcements from the X Games and U.S. Ski Team. Of course for guys like Jeff and I, it simply feels good to know that the website we grew up on is independent once again. For more on this, check out the announcement on Newschoolers.com.