On May 1, chairs from the Arapahoe Basin Exhibition Lift will go on sale, as the ski area prepares to replace it with a detatchable quad.
The Exhibition triple chairlift has been turning since 1978, and it moves more people around the ski area than any other lift each ski seaon. Of the lift's 118 chairs, 110 will be available for purchase on a first-come, first-served basis for $450 apiece. Local nonprofits will use the remaining chairs for fundraising purposes.
“The Exhibition lift is a great lift with few maintenance issues, but now is the time to replace it,” A-Basin chief operations officer Alan Henceroth said. “The new lift will have increased capacity, shorter ride time and easier loading. It will provide rapid, easy access to the upper mountain, Montezuma Bowl, and Black Mountain Lodge.”
The new lift, dubbed Black Mountain Express, will have a capacity of 2,000 people per hour, a length of 2,877 feet and a vertical rise of 719 feet. Ride time from the base area to mid-mountain will be just shorter than three minutes — half the time of a ride up Exhibition. Construction is scheduled to beging around mid-June and will not impact the current season's closing date, tentatively scheduled for June 6.
The eight donated Exhibition chairs will go to the Summit Foundation, High Country Conservation Center, Team Summit, Summit County Community Care Clinic, Colorado Avalanche Information Center, the Family and Intercultural Resource Center, Friends of the Dillon Ranger District and the Keystone Science School.
Sale of the chairs will begin online at 8 a.m., Saturday, May 1, at www.arapahoebasin.com. The chairs will be available for pick-up on June 11 and 12 at A-Basin.
A pick-up truck or similar vehicle is recommended to transport the chairs. Arapahoe Basin will not take reservations in advance for the purchase of the chairs. All sales are final, and chairs should be used at the purchasers' own risk.
