A US ski area with 636 feet (194 metres) of vertical is to have a major lift upgrade for winter 2023-24 with the region's first high-speed six-seater chairlift installed, replacing three old lifts.
The new lift is going in at the Jackson Creek Summit area which makes up Snowriver Mountain Resort in Michigan with two other areas. It will be the first high-speed detachable lift in the Upper Peninsular area.
The new lift will be built and installed by Doppelmayr and will be named the Voyageur Express. The lift will feature 53 chairs and have a three-and-a-half-minute ride to the top travelling at 1,000 ft/min instead of the 8-10 minutes, plus stops, it took with the existing fixed grip lifts.
The new lift will replaces the Chippewa Double, Leelinaw Triple and Voyager Quad fixed-grip chairlifts. The lift's initial capacity will be 2,800 people per hour (pph) with the option to upgrade to 3,200 pph in the future should additional capacity be needed.
The Chippewa Double, Leelinaw Triple and the Voyager Quad are three of the original chairlifts from the 1960s, installed soon after founder Jack English brought skiing and riding to the U.P. back in 1959.
"The new lift will greatly enhance our guest experience at Jackson Creek Summit," stated first year GM Benjamin Bartz. "Because the new lift will be much easier for guests to load and unload, we anticipate smoother operations, meaning guests will spend more time skiing and less time sitting on a lift."
Snowriver Mountain Resort combines Big Snow Resort, Jackson Creek Summit and Black River Basin ski areas.
Black River Basin is the new name for the ski area formerly known as Blackjack and Jackson Creek Summit the ski area formerly known as Indianhead. Both were renamed along with other US ski areas that have changed their names following the Black Lives Matter movement.
"High speed lifts are a perfect fit for our Midwest ski areas," explained Charles Skinner, President, and Owner of Snowriver, Granite Peak and Lutsen Mountains. "High speed lifts transform the ski experience at our resorts from spending most of the ski day riding the chairlift or waiting in line to enjoying most of the day skiing down the hill."