Sugarbush Bids Farewell To 40 Year Old Lift

Heaven's Gate, a Poma triple chairlift, was notorious for breaking down often. The lift drops skiers off at the top of Lincoln's Peak. See below (to looker's left).

The good news is that things are progressing well for the resort's planned replacement of the old Heaven’s Gate Triple with a new faster fixed-grip Heaven’s Gate Quad. 

The project is starting, as planned, on time next week. 

The bad news is that this bullish construction schedule requires construction to begin this Monday, April 1st, which means this Sunday, March 31 will be the last day for the four-decades old Heaven’s Gate Triple to spin. 

Watch some relaxing footage of skiers riding up the historic Heaven's Gate lift below. 

These improvements come shortly after multiple other snowmaking projects at Lincoln Peak that were completed within the last year, including adding snowmaking to the newly recut Reverse Traverse (now combined with the old Heaven’s Gate Traverse to simply all be called Heaven’s Gate Traverse). 

The reason this lift closure is especially bad news is because Sugarbush just got dumped on. 

Resort officials defend the decision, writing, "there are about a million moving parts when it comes to installing a new quad chair, and we need to ensure we have enough time to properly do the work so the new chair spins when the snow falls next season."

Sugarbush will also be closing the Castlerock Double after this weekend along with all the terrain skier’s-left of Lower Organgrinder including Downspout, Domino, parts of Lower Jester and Heaven’s Gate Traverse, and Gondolier.

But the light at the end of the tunnel is a greatly-improved lift experience for Sugarbush skiers next season.