Comments on: Have your say: skinning in or through ski resorts?

By: Evan Shipp

Evan Shipp — Wed, 21 Apr 2010 16:40:10 +0000

Have skinned up ski areas for many years with little problems, but it appears that popularity breeds regulation. My comment is that since most ski areas are on federal land and you have to skin through ski areas to get to other terrain that it is an issue of public accessibility. The problems that ski areas claim regarding uphill traffic and sagety are BS. A skinner moving at 1 mph should be just as avoidable as a stationary downhill skier and the skinner is more abt to be on the side of the run.

By: Pax

Pax — Thu, 12 Nov 2009 19:38:23 +0000

I live in an area with three resorts. One is on FS land and bans uphill travel outright; one (also on FS land) allows uphill travel only before and after the season; the last (private and FS) allows uphill travel on three prescribed routes. I take advantage of both that offer the uphill travel.

I feel that like anything, the actions of a very few dictate the policies for the rest of us. I have heard of people skiing into winch cables (snow cats use winches), over high voltage electricity, high pressure water lines, and into snowmobiles. Resorts have a hard enough time in the States operating with draconian insurance premiums that if a handful of incidents occur, it will be out of the resorts’ hands to even make the decision–the answer will simply be “NO!!!”

Great to see dialogue on the subject.

By: Stano

Stano — Mon, 26 Oct 2009 19:26:58 +0000

Mike, thanks for your input. Those are the issues that need to be addressed if a ski resort like Alta would take a friendlier stand towards skinning. The problem is that people are being stupid themselves at lots of situations but even then they go suing the resort for damages.

On the other hand I feel lots of times that “resorts are making everything they can to not do anything they could” – tough statement to read but it’s what I feel like some times.

By: Mike

Mike — Sat, 24 Oct 2009 04:10:55 +0000

At Alta, UT the main reason for not allowing skinning(up hill travel) is because of avalanche control work. It is very hard to maintain thousands of acres of ski resort without knowing if there are people around, sweeping areas takes along time especially when dawn patrol can start very early depending on conditions. And being around ski resorts there is alot on snowmobile travel, cats that have to maintain grooming routes, and a skier w/out headlamp is invisable, and even with a headlamp can be not noticeable til too late in heavy snow. Ski resorts already have to deal with fools sueing them(why are lift tickets so spendy ?) they would be asking for more issues if they allowed people to travel in said area’s w/out a written contract(lift tix).

Mike

By: Stano

Stano — Fri, 16 Oct 2009 20:37:32 +0000

Great points Joal!

No one mentioned this before, snowmobilers and boot-packing really fall into the same category as skinners in terms of safety, thus liabilities and insurance.

And I think Joal mentioned (I think it was him) in our discussion before another excellent fact: “show me some documented reports of some one on skins causing an injury to a downhill skier, and compare an amount of these reports to the ones that record accidents among normal skiers.”

This is a very valid request/question to any ski resort that is trying to kick you out based on the “safety” argument. I bet they wouldn’t be able to show you even one or two reports about this, therefore making their claims unfounded and unsupported.