Full Steam Ahead – Transforming the Base Area Experience
Transforming the experience
While Steamboat has been shaped by its rich past, today, with this project, we look forward to shaping the future. We’re investing $200 million on and around our mountain, so we can enhance the Steamboat experience for everyone who visits us. This unprecedented venture will help to make us one of the premier ski destinations in the world for decades to come.
This is an ambitious undertaking the likes of which our resort has never seen. With plans for an après ski plaza, new restaurants and bars, new lodging, a ski beach and an ice rink. On the Mountain – new lifts and new terrain that will make us the second largest resort in Colorado. In the tradition of our pioneering spirit and out of the genuine western heritage of Steamboat, comes and entirely new vision for our resort. Welcome to the new west.
Learning Center for All
The recently re-graded Rough Rider/Bashor Basin area will be the future home to the Greenhorn Ranch, an area that will be dedicated to beginner skiers and riders. Featuring a slope graded for beginners that will be a 0% to 15% angle, and progressive Terrain-Based Learning developed with Snow Operating and a dedicated chairlift.
The lower leg of the Wild Blue Gondola will have an unloading option at Greenhorn Ranch starting for the winter 22/23 season making access to beginner terrain easy for those new to skiing and riding.
A Top-to-Bottom Gondola
The new Wild Blue Gondola will be the longest gondola in North America and the fastest 10-person gondola in the country. With the lower leg opening in winter 22/23, and the upper leg opening in 23/24, the state-of-the-art gondola will feed skiers/riders through a newly created mid-station adjacent to Bashor bowl with the final destination at the top of Sunshine Peak.
At a total length of 3.16 miles, the new gondola will increase the out of base capacity from 6,000 people per hour to 10,000 people per hour, getting skiers from bottom to top in 13 minutes.
Base Area Experience
Steamboat Square will transform with plans for an après ski plaza, new restaurants and bars, retail outlets, ice rink, fire pits and a stage for live music.
- Ice Skating
- Food & Dining
- Better Access
- Retail Shops
- Entertainment
On-Mountain
The mountain will also spend $5.4 million on various projects that will enhance the resort’s infrastructure. Steamboat will invest $2 million for on-mountain improvements “to snowmaking, lift maintenance, ski patrol equipment and mountain machinery[new snowcats/groomers].” The Sunshine Express lift will undergo an $800,000 maintenance project, nearly $500,000 will be spent on new ski and snowboard rental gear from Rossignol and Burton, and $400,000 will be spent to upgrade their Walton Pond employee housing complex.
This follows the first phase of the project last summer, which saw the “demolition of the Gondola building, relocation of the lower gondola terminal, and the addition of escalators from the resort’s main entrance to Steamboat Square.” The final phase will be completed in time for the 2023-24 season, with phase two of their Wild Blue Gondola going from Greenhorn Ranch to the top of Sunshine Peak, the Pioneer Ridge expansion, and concluding their Steamboat Square remodel. The Pioneer Ridge expansion will add “655 acres of advanced/expert terrain and a detachable quad.” When Steamboat expands onto Pioneer Ridge, it will become the second-largest ski resort in Colorado.
