The Gore Mountain Blog

I’m fascinated by lifts and lift technology, so I was excited when GM Mike Pratt offered me the chance to visit Gore Mountain for an update on the new lift, the Adirondack Express 2.

As we were driving into the parking lot, we saw all of the new lift parts lined up in the parking lot, ready to go.

The new high speed quad is a bottom drive with the same configuration as the relatively new Burnt Ridge Quad. The motor is 700 horsepower and runs off of 480 volts.

Max design speed for the new lift is 1100 feet per minute (fpm) like the Burnt Ridge Quad and Gondola. While it’s unlikely that it will be run at full speed, it will still be considerably faster than the old lift.

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Recently we had the chance to see the progress that’s been made on Gore’s big summer project: the replacement of the Adirondack Express.  What impressed us was the amount of work that’s required to complete a job of this size.

The original lift required twenty-eight towers to cover the 7000 foot expanse from Gore’s base to the saddle on Bear Mountain. The new express will require twenty free-standing lift towers to do the same.

Each one of those twenty towers will sit on a deep footing that will rest below grade on a surface that was blasted out of bedrock. Within each of these craters a form is being built that will contain the rebar, concrete and bolt configuration needed to hold up the massive towers.

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