Skier visits record for the USA and a not so great a snow year – who could guess that would happen. Let’s all thank a snowmaker for enabling such a thing. This a bit of a surprise but it demonstrates how dependent the ski industry is on snowmaking and how the skiing public takes it for granted. As we all know the future climate impacts will be the warming of the climate preventing us from making snow.
On a more positive note, I attended the 50th Rocky Mountain Lift Association (RMLA) Conference in Grand Junction, Colorado where over 560 attendees enjoyed a really well-run conference. My kudos to the RMLA board, all volunteers, Jennifer Larson, and the NSAA staff for a very well-organized and run event. There was a high level of engagement and excitement around ski lifts.
I had the pleasure and honor of leading two sessions. Both sessions were learning experiences for me and rewarding in the engagement with many very ski lift enthusiastic people. Participating in this conference reinforced my belief in the value of staff engagement and the need to advocate for the industry’s ski lift technicians and lift operators.
In this issue of the Steep Newsletter, I will share a post on what I learned about the future of lift maintenance, a topic I facilitated at RMLA, and a post on the potential future use of technology to make lift maintenance more predictive.
