SAM Magazine--Park City, Utah, Feb. 19, 2004--Powdr Corp. has named Peter Curtis to be president and general manager of Park City Mountain Resort. Curtis replaces Vern Greco, who became chief operating officer of Powdr a week ago. "Peter is a seasoned industry veteran and has demonstrated strong leadership qualities in his six years at Park City...

SAM Magazine--Tupper Lake, N.Y., Feb. 19, 2004--A group of investors from Philadelphia has agreed to buy 6,400 acres, including the defunct Big Tupper ski area and thousands of acres around it, with the goal of creating a year-round resort. The Big Tupper ski area has been closed for the last four winters. Michael Foxman, one of the project's ei...

SAM Magazine--Big Sky, Mont., February 24, 2004--Boyne USA, the owners of Big Sky resort, have filed a suit against neighboring newcomer, Moonlight Basin Ranch. According to the Bozeman Daily Chronicle, the suit alleges that Moonlight Basin is trespassing on Big Sky property and endangering its employees and clients. The two areas share a boundary ...

SAM Magazine--Ludlow, Vt., March 2, 2004--As of March 1, Tim and Diane Mueller are the proud owners of Crested Butte Ski Resort in Colorado. The Muellers, who own Okemo, Vt., and run Mount Sunapee, N.H., purchased the resort from the Callaway and Walton families for an undisclosed amount, though speculation puts the figure at about $50 million. ...

SAM Magazine--Killington, Vt., Mar. 3, 2004--In their continuing protest against high taxes on second homes, Killington voters approved a proposal to secede from Vermont and join the state of New Hampshire at the town's annual meeting Mar. 2. Vermont's Act 60 and Act 68, passed years ago, set higher tax rates for second-home properties than for ...

SAM Magazine--Fraser, Colo., Mar. 3, 2004--Marise Cipriani is repositioning her SolVista ski area again, changing the name to The Granby Ranch and marketing the ski area and its related real estate as an affordable mountain resort community. Cipriani purchased the SilverCreek ski area in 1995, and renamed it SolVista in 2000. The Granby Ranch co...

SAM Magazine--Park City, Utah, Mar. 10, 2004--American Skiing Company (ASC) lost $21.7 million in its fiscal second quarter ended Jan. 31, 2004, compared to a loss of $16.7 million for second quarter of 2003. For the first six months of fiscal 2004, net loss totalled $62.9 million, compared with a net loss of $55.8 million in the corresponding peri...

SAM Magazine--Vail, Colo., Mar. 10, 2004--Vail Resorts, Inc. reported a net loss for the six months ended Jan. 31, 2004 of $32.1 million, compared to a net loss of $8.4 million for the same period last year. Excluding charges for early extinguishment of debt and mold remediation at the Breckenridge Terrace employee housing, Vail's expected net l...

SAM Magazine--Denver, Colo., March 12, 2004--Visits to resorts in Colorado were up 3.5 percent over year-ago levels in January and February, according to Colorado Ski Country USA. Areas recorded 4,982,652 visits during the period. Destination visits led the rise. Destination resorts hosted 1,582,555 visits (a 6.1 percent increase over 2002-03) i...

SAM Magazine--North Creek, N.Y., March 12, 2004--The state comptroller has endorsed a proposal to link Gore Mountain and the North Creek Ski Bowl, create 2,500 new lodging beds and extend passenger train service from Saratoga Springs to North Creek, providing New Yorkers direct train service to the resort. Comptroller Alan Hevesi predicted the d...

SAM Magazine--Vail, Colo., March 17, 2004--Booth Creek resort operations revenues rose 2 percent for the first quarter ended Jan. 30, 2004, to $47,315,000, as earlier openings at Sierra-at-Tahoe and the Summit areas in Washington State offset a slower season in the East. Increased snow school, equipment rental, retail and food and beverage sales al...

SAM Magazine--McLean, Va., March 17, 2004--Overall sales for the winter sport market (including specialty and chain stores) increased 1.8 percent in dollars to $1.72 billion for August 2003 through January 2004, according to the SnowSports Industries America (SIA) Retail Audit. Unit sales were ahead 5.8 percent. Growing interest in Nordic and telem...

SAM Magazine--Avon, Colo., March 23, 2004--In "Operation Freedom Lodging," Keystone and Breckenridge are offering 1,000 complimentary room nights to troops returning from Iraq and Afghanistan for R&R. Rooms are available between April 1 and December 16. A soldier from any branch of the military who has served on active duty for more than 30 days...

SAM Magazine--Donnelly, Ida., March 25, 2004--Jim Spenst is joining Tamarack Resort as vice president of operations. Spenst is currently vice president of mountain operations for Copper Mountain Resort, and will remain in that position through the current season. At Tamarack, Spenst will oversee lift operations, the Alpine and Nordic trail syste...

SAM Magazine--Winter Park, Colo., March 25, 2004--Explosives used for avalanche control were stolen from the Winter Park ski area last weekend. On Monday morning, ski resort patrollers found that an undisclosed number of high-explosive Trojan Boosters, cylinders packed with pentaerythritol tetranitrate, had been taken from a locked storage shed...