| Just when it seemed the final nail had been hammered into the coffin of one of North America’s oldest ski resorts, a group of local investors are pooling their resources to try to breathe new life into Mount Norquay. With a surprise opening on November 1 that beat out all other ski resorts in the country, it looks like they’re off to a good start.
"We've beat the record, and we may surpass the greatest year we've had, which was 2000," says Stephen Ross, a member of the group who purchased the resort. He joins former Crazy Canuck Ken Read, who just a few months earlier had written an open letter to the ski industry appealing to it to keep the historic resort from going under. Now he’s putting his money where his mouth is alongside Jeff Kohn of Calgary and Peter, Robert and Len Sudermann of Fortune Resorts in trying to keep the resort from going downhill.
"Mount Norquay’s continued survival will essentially mean that Banff remains a ski town," says Ross. He notes that Norquay will maintain its position as a family ski resort, with a focus on value and a variety of programs from ski racing to snowboarding.
Norquay towers over the Banff townsite and is frequented by locals and Calgarians lured by the resort’s pay-by-the-hour lift tickets. It has been losing money for several years, feeling the crunch from declining skier visits and hindered by national park development restrictions.
"One of the biggest things we have to do is get the word out to the Calgary region that Norquay is there, and has been there for 83 years, but there are still people that don’t know it’s there," he says. "We are excited about this opportunity and the challenge. Norquay is a great place to ski and has yet to be discovered by most people. We will also be focusing on the beginner skier and the family as a whole. We need to introduce more people to this great sport of skiing as one of the few sports that families can do together. Without the beginner and the family we neglect the future of the sport."
He says there are also plans to beef up the terrain park program once again. For years, Banff locals along with Calgary riders in-the-know frequented Norquay specifically for the finely tuned park. Ross says this is going to be another key area for improvement.
In addition to winter operations, the group aims to enhance and expand the summer operations of the resort – a position that puts them at odds with Parks Canada, which has resisted summer operations at Norquay since it provides summer habitat for grizzly bear and elk. In an industry that has looked past the traditional sense of skiing to usher in an era of high-speed lifts, mountainside living and welcomed summer business with options such as mountain biking, the resorts in the national parks are definitely feeling the squeeze. The parameters put in place by former Heritage minister Sheila Copps several years ago don’t jive with today’s competitive resort marketplace. Increasingly, Calgary skiers and riders are choosing to drive right past Banff into the B.C. resorts that continually upgrade to offer a fuller resort experience.
Ross says Banff brings in about three times as many tourists over the summer months as in the winter, and the two other hills, Lake Louise and Sunshine Village, operate healthy summer businesses that help keep them afloat. "All the other ski hills can have summer business and we can't," he claims.
The new owners believe they can work in co-operation with Parks Canada and within the current guidelines to promote and develop Mount Norquay’s potential into the future.
Check out banffnorquay.com for lift ticket pricing and mountain information. |
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