While the Skyline crew has been making steady progress on tower footings this week, chainsaws have been buzzing over on the east side of the mountain as our glade crew continues working on the Burnt Mountain expansion. The crew has been back at work for the past few weeks, and lest we lose track of their progress, we tagged along with them this morning to check out what they’re up to.

So far the crew has been concentrating on expanding, cleaning up, and generally improving what they began in Brackett Basin and Cant Dog last year. Several large clumps of timber around the area known as the “French Cliffs” have been thinned out, making for several acres of new terrain and greatly improved access back to the King Pine Quad. And of course, more open terrain in Brackett means more fresh lines on powder days, which is obviously what matter most here.

Roddy Ehrlenbach, our Assistant Ski Patrol Director who runs the glade crew in the summer months, breifly explains some of the recent cutting in this video:

This year’s crew consists of eight full time cutters (Roddy, Dave, Jesse, Mahlon, Johnny, Hunter, Dustin, and Caleb) - seven with chainsaws and one with a pole saw. This crew will be responsible for cutting new lines and shaping the character of the terrain. Later in the summer, they’ll be joined by a crew of temporary workers who will come in to clear out the smaller brush that is left behind.

Once this initial phase of cleaning up and improving upon last years cutting is finished, the crew will begin to move further out towards Burnt, where they will begin opening up lots of brand new lines. If you skied out in the Birler, Edger and Sweeper glades last season, you likely recall passing by a fairly large amount of uncut timber on your way out there. This summer the crew will be cutting roughly six new chutes in that area, which will connect with the Rough Cut glade at the bottom. They’ll move beyond that, too, with new lines extending far out into Phase II as it is marked on the trail map.

And as has always been the case with this project, we are working hard to ensure that all cutting is done in a responsible way that protects the unique alpine ecosystems and the various animals that call the area home. We have weekly visits from professional foresters and state biologists, who help us to ensure that we are preserving the habitats of some of the more vulnerable species out there, including the Bicknell’s Thrush.

Our crew is working hard every day and they’re in for a busy summer. Thanks for all of your hard work boys, we can’t wait to test it out.

For additional photos, check out the full album on the Sugarloaf Community.

All last week and straight into the weekend, the crew continued to pour concrete for the new tower footings. Pouring the concrete for the lift is the most time consuming portion of the entire project, so it’s important to get it finished up while summer is still young.

As of today we have 13 tower footings completed, leaving just six to go. If all goes to plan and weather cooperates, it looks like the concrete work should be wrapped by next week sometime.

Here’s a little bit of video that some of the crew shot on Saturday.

We also began excavating the old Spillway B unload area today, as you can see in the photo below. The Skyline Quad will not have a mid-station, so the old, earthen platform where the unload used to sit needs to be removed. The material will be used for additional backfill on a number of the new towers.

On Wednesday we’ll be tagging along with the glade cutting crew to check in on the progress in Phase II of the Burnt Mountain expansion. Check back for pics and videos of chainsaws in action later this week.

It’s been a busy week and things are starting to move pretty quickly here as the first pieces of the new Skyline Quad start to take shape. Several members of the Doppelmayr crew were on site this week to begin pouring the footings for the new towers.

As with any chairlift project, one of the biggest challenges is figuring out how to get the cement to the tower locations. Since chairlifts tend to travel over steep, unfriendly terrain, cement truck typically can’t drive directly to the base of the towers. To overcome this, our crew devised a technique using two skidders, two excavators, and monster-truck-like tractor called “The White,” and a cement truck.

Each skidder was equipped with a large bucket, which was filled with cement from the truck. With the bucket full, the skidder driver would back down the trail to the tower location, where a waiting excavator would take the bucket, move it into place, and then dump the cement.

To get back up the trail, the skidder was hooked up to a long cable, which passed through a snatch-block attached to the second excavator at the top of the trail. The other end of the cable was attached to The White, which would pull the skidder up the steep trail, where it would refill the bucket at start the process again. The goal was to have the skidders pass each other on the way up and down, to keep a nearly continuous stream of cement flowing to the footing. It was certainly an involved process, but much more efficient and less costly than a helicopter, which is what many lift projects are forced to use at this stage.

After three days of this work, the footings for towers 1-7 are now complete, as well as the footing for the base terminal. Next week the crew will work on finishing towers 8-13, leaving only six to go before all of the footings are poured.

Check out some video of the crew in action below, plus some additional photos from this morning.

Find more photos like this on Sugarloaf Community

Since we made the announcement back in February that we would be installing a new lift this summer to replace Spillway, one of the questions we’ve heard more than any other has been: “What will the new lift be called?”

Well, if you’re a regular reader of our local community newspaper, The Original Irregular, you may already know the answer to that question. Once each month, The Irregular publishes a column, “View From The Top,” written by various members of Sugarloaf’s management team. In last week’s issue the column was written by our Vice President of Mountain Operations, Rich “Crusher” Wilkinson, and in it, he announced the new name for the lift, as well as a few other interesting news items.

So what’s the name? After much consideration, research, and debate, our new lift will officially be known as the “Skyline Quad.” As Crusher explained in last week’s column, “Skyline” is a logging term which refers to a method of removing logs from difficult-to-access areas via a long, suspended cable, or skyline. The name fits well with Sugarloaf’s logging heritage, and signals the start of a new chapter in the Sugarloaf story.

Also in the column, Crusher introduced a new member of the Sugarloaf team, Keil Thompson. Keil will join us in the newly created position of “Director of Lifts,” and will oversee both the Lift Maintenance and Lift Operations Departments. With nearly 40 years experience in the construction, maintenance, and operation of chairlifts throughout North America, Keil is uniquely qualified to oversee all aspects of our lift operations. He has served as Director of Lifts and Lift Maintenance at several resorts, and was in charge of the design and construction of nine lifts at the Yellowstone Club in Montana. Welcome, Keil!  

You can read Crusher’s full column right here.

Yesterday we said a final farewell to Spillway East, with a group of 40-50 Sugarloafers taking part in a ceremonial final ride up the lift. It was a festive occasion as all gathered at the bottom of the lift just before closing time to celebrate the final day of operation for Spillway. 

The final ride was used as a fundraiser for the non-profit Ski Museum of Maine, with an auction during this year’s Passholders’ BBQ for the official final chair. The auction ended up netting a total of $8000 for the Museum, with two parties bidding $4000 each for the last two chairs (they also get to keep the chairs in which they rode). In addition, 40 or so individuals contributed $100 each to take part in the official final ride.

With the final chapter in Spillway’s history now written, it’s time to look to the future, and the installation of the brand-new quad this summer. As we posted last week, the process of dismantling Spillway West has already begun, and will continue this week when we remove the haul rope.

Stay tuned!

Find more photos like this on Sugarloaf Community

The chairs have all come off of Spillway West now, and if you’re here this weekend you’ll see them lined up neatly at the bottom of the SuperQuad. Spillway East will continue to operate through Sunday, May 1. Next week we’ll begin the process of removing those chairs and taking down the haul rope from both lifts.

Our first powder day of the season hit us on Tuesday, and while were partaking of the morning’s freshness, many of us shared a common thought: “I can’t wait until I’m doing this in Brackett Basin.” (Or something along those lines.) Today we took one more small, but notable step towards turning that dream into a reality, with the installation of the new sign at the official Brackett Basin entrance.

Sure, a sign is just a sign, but this one will be the welcome mat for skiers and riders for years to come as they embark on one of the most unique alpine adventures in the East. So as signs go, it’s a pretty good one.

When we first announced Sugarloaf 2020 and the Burnt Mountain terrain expansion, we showed you a basic trail map with the three distinct phases highlighted in various colors. This week we finished converting that initial image into our new, detailed trail map, complete with eight brand new names for lines in Brackett Basin. Keeping with Sugarloaf’s history the new names are all logging terms. Here they are, with definitions, and you can view a full size version of the new trailmap by clicking on the image below. 

• Birler Glade - A birler is a person who works on floating logs to help them float downstream.
• Edger Glade - An edger is a machine with multiple saw blades that cut slabs of wood into various widths
• Sweeper Glade - A sweeper is a cedar tree whose roots have been undermined by flowing water, causing the tree to lean out over the water. These trees received their name because they were known to sweep men and materials from rafts floating down the river
• Rough Cut Glade - “Rough Cut” wood is prefinished lumber that hasn’t been dried, planed, or otherwise dressed
• Red Horse Glade - “Red Horse” is what loggers called salt beef.
• Blacksmith Glade - Blacksmiths were crucial to the logging industry, forging numerous tools and horseshoes.
• Highball Glade - A term used among railroad workers and loggers, to “highball” something meant to hurry, or do it quickly
• Logging Road - A road cut for equipment access into a logging area. This term on the map is quite literal, as this is the road that the logging company constructed this summer to harvest the timber out of the lower reaches of Brackett Basin. 

We’re sure you all wanted to be there for the official announcement of Sugarloaf 2020 and the new Brackett Basin yesterday, but the realities of physics being what they are, we couldn’t really have squeezed 20 thousand people into the Carrabassett Room at the Hotel. So here’s the next best thing. Courtesy of WSKI-TV, watch Stephen Kircher (President of Boyne Resorts) and John Diller unveil the new trail map to the press.

Thank you for checking out the new Sugarloaf 2020 web site, and welcome to our new blog, where we’ll be providing regular updates for you as we embark on an exciting new decade here at Sugarloaf.

If you haven’t had a chance to browse the entire web site yet, we’d encourage you to take a few moments and do so. You’ll find details on terrain expansions, new lifts, snowmaking upgrades, enhancements to the Sugarloaf Village, and improvements to current summertime offerings, all scheduled to take place with the next ten years. You’ll also find a timeline detailing investments that have already been made at the resort since 2007, when Sugarloaf joined Boyne Resorts.

This blog will serve as your go-to location for all of the latest information as the developments detailed on this web site unfold. We’ll provide updates on new and ongoing projects, as well as photos and videos.

It’s an exciting time to be at Sugarloaf, and the work has already started on several of the Sugarloaf 2020 projects, including cutting in the new Brackett Basin area, the upgrades to the exterior of the Sugarloaf Base Lodge, and of course the brand new zip line course that opened earlier this summer. Scroll to the bottom of this post for some photos of our glade crew in action, and of our new zip lines.

We hope you’ll check in on the blog regularly over the next several years as these exciting developments continue to unfold. If you have any questions, or would like to share your thoughts, feel free to do so at any time in the comments section below.