Busiest Ski Areas in North America

[Nathanvg]

Per the Vanat report linked below, the busiest ski areas (in terms of skier-days per year) are:

1. WB (2.2 million skier-days)
2. Breck (1.8)
3. Vail (1.7)
4. PC (1.3)
5. Mammoth (1.2)
6. Keystone (1.2)
7. Copper (1.1)

It's often hard to come by accurate numbers for skier-days since ski areas treat these as trade secrets. A few things that stood out to me:

• Vail has 5 of the top 7 busiest ski areas in N America, that's a lot of market share.
• The busiest ski areas in the world Arlberg, has 2.5 million days, which is only 13% more than Blackcomb.
• The European ski areas are actually ski regions that are not fully interconnected. e.g. riding buses, hiking, or long back country traversing to get around the ski area/region. For example, Arlberg requires riding a bus to get to Klosterle and half of the ski area is only connected via a long gondola (can't ski either way, this route was formerly bus service as well) You could make a rational argument that the biggest ski regions are actually in the US. e.g. breck and keystone are connected by bus and have about 3M skier days. Similarly, a gondola like the new one in Arlberg connecting copper and breck would be the busiest ski area. Alta/snowbird/parkcity/deer valley already could be considered a region since they are connected via backcountry too.
• The report didn't list ski areas with less than 1 million skier-days per year but other sources list Steamboat, Beaver Creek, Heavenly, North Star and Aspen (including all 4 mountains) at around 1 million days as well. In the 500k-1M range are lot of ski areas including east coast ski areas (Okemo is typically quoted highest at about 700k) and many Western areas (bachelor 500k, Jackson 600k, Big Sky 500k, Telluride 500k). Squaw, Killington, Alta-bird, snowbasin, winter park numbers are hard to come by but likely all 500k plus.

I am not a big fan of the Vanat's conclusions since I think he's a bit of a European homer but the report is interesting none the less: https://www.vanat.ch/RM-world-report-2020.pdf

 

[Sibhusky]

^^^^
Ski areas to avoid.

 

[Tony S]

^^^^
Ski areas to avoid.

Yup. I was fairly horrified by my first trip through the Park City / Canyons / Deer Valley corridor this winter. Couldn't get out of there fast enough. Yuck. Personal taste, I readily acknowledge.

 

[djetok]

Yup. I was fairly horrified by my first trip through the Park City / Canyons / Deer Valley corridor this winter. Couldn't get out of there fast enough. Yuck. Personal taste, I readily acknowledge.

I agree. At PC when they merged the two, we went on the scenic house trail. 16 people wide skiing , no thank you

 

[Après Skier]

^^^^
Ski areas to avoid.

To be fair, the large North American destination resorts (with certain exceptions) are largely uncrowded during the week; crowds are rarely a problem on non-holiday weekdays. In the Alps, since Europeans tends to take week-long ski trips, the weekdays tend to be busy.

I ski primarily mid-week in North America at resorts reputed for crowding, I almost never wait in lift lines and I often feel I have the mountain to myself.

 

[jmills115]

Yup. I was fairly horrified by my first trip through the Park City / Canyons / Deer Valley corridor this winter. Couldn't get out of there fast enough. Yuck. Personal taste, I readily acknowledge.

These are the ski areas I would recommend to all coming into Utah

 

[surfandski]

To be fair, the large North American destination resorts (with certain exceptions) are largely uncrowded during the week; crowds are rarely a problem on non-holiday weekdays. In the Alps, since Europeans tends to take week-long ski trips, the weekdays tend to be busy.

I ski primarily mid-week in North America at resorts reputed for crowding, I almost never wait in lift lines and I often feel I have the mountain to myself.

I agree with you on non-powder days but all bets are off at the big resorts on storm days. That's the one thing that stood out to me the most in the 3 weeks we spent skiing Utah this year. The proximity of SLC to LCC and BCC (we didn't ski DV on storm days so it wasn't too bad mid week) allows so many people to grab freshies before work and then head out by 11. I couldn't believe how quickly the powder got devoured at Snowbird (and to a lesser extent Alta) on a week day. I've seen similar destruction at WP, Breck, Copper, etc from the Denver crowd but it's just so much more geographically convenient to hit the powder hard and still be to work by lunch in SLC. Altabird is up there amongst my favorites but on a mid-week powder day, you can get about 4-5x as many powder runs at Jackson Hole which is one of a few reasons why it's #1 in my book. And for being #5 on that list, Mammoth skis quite well mid-week or at least it did the couple seasons I lived there.

 

[Nathanvg]

^^^^
Ski areas to avoid.

I am a big fan of ski areas with low crowds, so I generally agree but I would still recommend these ski areas to many people. For example: Vail's back bowls are a ton of fun for advanced skiers with 4k acres to explore and usually lifts do not have lines. Brecks high alpine is a lot of fun but brecks groomers are a zoo. Park City's Silverlode, King Con and Tombstone lifts get pretty busy but the rest is usually uncrowded. Mammoth skis great in the late spring.

Also, some ski areas have more fluctuation day to day. East coast ski areas are great midweek and real busy most weekends. Ski areas with large non-winter lodging bases are usually swamped on holidays. For example, the worst lift line I experienced in the last 10 years was at Whitefish on president's weekend, over 30 minutes. And I ski Vail every year so that's saying something. To be fair, that line is rare at Whitefish and I know which lifts to avoid at certain times of the day at Vail.

If you're looking for low crowds, look at ski areas that are far from a major metro areas and ideally have a high acre to lift ratio while not having a reputation for lines. E.g ski areas like Panorama not only rarely have lines but typically have most of the chairs empty. Panorama also have 4k vert and 4 lifts. If you see someone on a run, that's a surprise. Telluride, Crested Butte, Sun Valley, almost everything in BC except Whistler and a ton of smaller ski areas are all great for low crowds.

 

[Tony S]

Park City's Silverlode, King Con and Tombstone lifts get pretty busy but the rest is usually uncrowded.

No doubt. My problem with the big resorts that are resorts is the sheer amount of commercialism and bodies and parents and kids and cars that swarm the whole vicinity. Just not an introvert's thing.

I spent a week at AltaBird this February, day tripping, and never had more than a five minute walk from car to lift. (Less, at Alta, even on a lovely 6"'day.) Never had trouble finding a seat near the coffee bar at the Goldminer in the morning to boot up, or afternoon, or in their lounge aprés. Racks available for boot bags.

Deer Valley, by contrast. Omg. Horrendous.

 

[PinnacleJim]

Agree report had a Eurpoean bias, but still interesting. And note Killington continues to log the most skier days in the East. Since they are not public, they are not obligated to release actual numbers to the public and they choose not to. Estimates are it's around 800,000. When owned by ASC, the numbers released were around 1,000,000.

 

[DanoT]

My favourite big resort in the USA is Aspen. This is because with no large urban population nearby and 4 mountains, it does not get crowded, and Sat and Sun are largely arrival and departure days.

On powder days all the powder hounds go to Aspen Mtn or Highlands leaving fresh untracked pow turns until noon at Snowmass and untracked all day at Buttermilk.

 

[Sibhusky]

For example, the worst lift line I experienced in the last 10 years was at Whitefish on president's weekend, over 30 minutes.

You've been saying that for long enough I know it was before the Flower Point and East Rim chairs went in. That has dispersed much of the potential congestion. I myself rarely ski chair 1 after the first run.

But it's fine if everyone thinks that will happen.

 

[Après Skier]

@surfandski I had heard when the snow is falling, the powder-obsessed locals can turn LCC into a dreary chore so although Altabird is my favorite in the SLC area, when a storm rolled in during my trip I opted to take the UTA Ski Bus to Solitude. Easy-peasy, neither crowded nor stressful. Later the following week I was staying in Park City when the snow started piling up again and I found Deer Valley to be wonderful on a powder day. And amazingly enough the DV powder day was less crowded than the hard-pack groomer days! Skiing freshies on the Ruins of Pompeii was definitely a highlight of the season.

You mentioned Jackson Hole as your #1 with Altabird high on the list as well. What are some of your other favs? Seems like you have been to a lot of places and have good taste.

@Nathanvg Thank you for sharing this report. Very interesting.

 

[Après Skier]

Squaw is another resort that becomes crowded on mid-week powder days. When I visited last season the traffic back-up to turn into the resort was miles long. I thought there had been an accident but no, it was everyone plus, their mother, brother, sister, ex-wife, and second cousin queued up to the enter the resort.

Question for Tahoe skiers: Is the mid-week powder-day crowding limited to Squaw or do the other Tahoe resorts draw oversized crowds as well? Would I have been better off at Alpine, Heavenly, Northstar, or Kirkwood? Don’t get me wrong, the powder day at Squaw was amazing I’m just a spoiled mid-week maven who has grown unaccustomed to crowds whilst skiing anywhere west of the Mississippi.


But at least there was A LOT of nice powder and scenery to go along with the traffic.

 

[David Chaus]

No doubt. My problem with the big resorts that are resorts is the sheer amount of commercialism and bodies and parents and kids and cars that swarm the whole vicinity. Just not an introvert's thing.

I spent a week at AltaBird this February, day tripping, and never had more than a five minute walk from car to lift. (Less, at Alta, even on a lovely 6"'day.) Never had trouble finding a seat near the coffee bar at the Goldminer in the morning to boot up, or afternoon, or in their lounge aprés. Racks available for boot bags.

Deer Valley, by contrast. Omg. Horrendous.

You, my friend, would love Red Mt or Whitewater.

 

[raytseng]

Squaw is another resort that becomes crowded on mid-week powder days. When I visited last season the traffic back-up to turn into the resort was miles long. I thought there had been an accident but no, it was everyone plus, their mother, brother, sister, ex-wife, and second cousin queued up to the enter the resort.

Question for Tahoe skiers: Is the mid-week powder-day crowding limited to Squaw or do the other Tahoe resorts draw oversized crowds as well? Would I have been better off at Alpine, Heavenly, Northstar, or Kirkwood? Don’t get me wrong, the powder day at Squaw was amazing I’m just a spoiled mid-week maven who has grown unaccustomed to crowds whilst skiing anywhere west of the Mississippi.

View attachment 101497
But at least there was A LOT of nice powder and scenery to go along with the traffic.

The tahoe scene is currently in flux.

The 18-19 season was first year of ikon, and many were sick of real bad competition at KW/HV/NS switched to try Ikon out. In prior seasons, there was huge competition at hv/kw/ns to get parking or on the slopes so the 2nd megapass was welcomed.
But many people in 18-19 had the same experience as you did at squaw/alpine and literally got turned away.
So in 19-20, the pendulum back the other way; and those people ditched ikon for clearer slopes; and there were actually very few Squaw weekend days where they actually declared "full" and they had to turn people away (versus many many weekends in 18-19); and afaik zero weekdays were "full".

So the future season is pretty much an wide open board of which way it will go. The war between epic/ikon rages strong in Tahoe; with guests shifting their alliances all over the place; and the pandemic clouds everything as well on how the operations may change (including developments and changes for parking/parking fees).

If you are planning a 1-time destination trip to Tahoe resorts in a future season, your best best to get a pulse on that season's trends is to go to the resort's Ops twitter feed and scroll back in history and check out prior Saturday tweets (or storm cycle tweets) to get a sense of when Parking becomes "full" and if/when they had to start turning people away. You can compare against the other resorts to get a true feel of your competition.

 

[Cheizz]

A bit on the observation points in the opening post...

In Europe, many big resorts have several ways to consulate these visits. Or rather, how to define 'resort'. In that same report, for example, Les Arcs (2.1 million) and La Plagne (2.5 million) are listed as two separate resorts. Together, it is known as "Paradiski". The two parts are connected by a big gondola. The same goes for Les Trois Vallées (Val Thorens, Les Menuires and Courchevel/Meribel), Espace Killy (Tigne and Val d'Isère). The last tow even more so, because unless you know, you won't be able to tell where one resort ends and the other begins. That's why I prefer the term "ski area" over "resort"... Anyway - my point is that not all European ski areas are or are not interconnected.

Moreover, the number of visits does not necessarily say anything about crows or places being busy. For that, one should put the number of skiers in relation to the amount of terrain or lift capacity available. Only then can you draw any kind of conclusion.

 

[Nathanvg]

Moreover, the number of visits does not necessarily say anything about crows or places being busy. For that, one should put the number of skiers in relation to the amount of terrain or lift capacity available. Only then can you draw any kind of conclusion.

Agreed, I used" busiest" as that was the term in the report but "popular" is more accurate. Crowds are much more complex to predict. A good example is Whitefish, Sun Valley and Keystone. All 3 are about the same size but Keystone gets about 3x as many skiers. It's clearly the busiest by a significant margin. Keystone is also close to Denver which means it spikes particularly badly on holidays.

Sun Valley and Whitefish both have about 400k skier days/year and both are great places to go to avoid crowds with one exception. Whitefish is much more prone to crowds on Holidays due to:

1. Whitefish has a huge lodging base due to glacier national park. Those lodges are empty in the winter so you can get killer deals even on holidays. In contrast sun valley has limited lodging. The result is much larger crowd spikes.
2. Sun Valley's lifts have over double the comfortable carrying capacity (CCC) which better handles holiday crowds. Quick stats that make up the CCC calculation: 9 high speed lifts vs 3, 10 major lifts (major=exceeding 500 vertical feet) vs. 7, 1800 vertical feet per lift vs 1200.
3. Whitefish has a few bottlenecks with big impacts. The biggest is lift 1. Lift 1 is the only way to get to 4 major lifts. One of those lifts, Hellroaring, requires you to reride lift 1 every lap. You can avoid riding lift 1 more than once but doing so eliminates skiing all of Hellroaring and many parts of the front side of the mountain, mabye 30% of the mountain.

Don't get me wrong, I plan to go back to Whitefish soon on a non-holiday week. And Whitefish isn't the only ski area to suffer these effect. Jackson Hole and Banff have issue #1. Mammoth and Revelstoke have bottlenecks with their Gondolas, issue #3. Etc. Every ski area near a major metro has a worse issue than issue #1. Etc.

 

[raisingarizona]

I bet a place like hunter gives em all a run for their money if you calculate skier visits vs. terrain acreage.

 

[surfandski]

Squaw is another resort that becomes crowded on mid-week powder days. When I visited last season the traffic back-up to turn into the resort was miles long. I thought there had been an accident but no, it was everyone plus, their mother, brother, sister, ex-wife, and second cousin queued up to the enter the resort.

Question for Tahoe skiers: Is the mid-week powder-day crowding limited to Squaw or do the other Tahoe resorts draw oversized crowds as well? Would I have been better off at Alpine, Heavenly, Northstar, or Kirkwood? Don’t get me wrong, the powder day at Squaw was amazing I’m just a spoiled mid-week maven who has grown unaccustomed to crowds whilst skiing anywhere west of the Mississippi.

View attachment 101497
But at least there was A LOT of nice powder and scenery to go along with the traffic.

Squaw's terrain makes it the go-to place for a lot of people on a deep day. I grew up in Tahoe but haven't lived there for quite some time but I'd still bet that of those you listed, Kirkwood would still be the least crowded on mid-week pow days. My parent's house was an easy walk to the Boulder lift (Heavenly) so it was my go to in High school but it's an admittedly LAME mountain on a powder day and warranted the occasional trip over to Kirkwood or N. shore. Or take the sleds into the back country. I then went to college in Reno and though much smaller, Sugar Bowl was a sleeper of a smaller, but less crowded, spot on a deep day.