 Poster: A snowHead
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Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
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Well, the person's real but it's just a made up name, see?
Well, the person's real but it's just a made up name, see?
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Some interesting stats there, and that's only at 200 metres. I just got back from my first trip to north wales, I was very impressed with the place. Home-made rope-tow, snow maker and a kind land owner that's all you need 
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mrpugster, A hydro electricity plant would be helpful too 
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Anyway, snowHeads is much more fun if you do.
Anyway, snowHeads is much more fun if you do.
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Well there's one of those also in North Wales
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You'll need to Register first of course.
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mrpugster, but I doubt it will give you 'free' electricity to power the snow making. However, if you could combine the hydro with the lift infrastructure investment that could help with long term revenues and lower running costs. However, LOTs of water required...
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my latest area has tree cover from 400m to 750m, a max height of 800m, a north to east facing aspect, a water supply and.......a dam
its 3 hours from london too!
it is in a steep sided valley running perpendicularly to the prevailing wind which creates cold pools.
information on cold air pooling http://www.rmets.org/pdf/presentation/20090520-brown.pdf
I would love to get some logging thermometers installed at 100m intervals this winter, it would be useful to have humidity measurements too.
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Sounds like a nice location, do you know owns the land?
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You'll get to see more forums and be part of the best ski club on the net.
You'll get to see more forums and be part of the best ski club on the net.
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forestry commission, so easy to get permission/have a right to buy if it benefits the locals.
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| Quote: |
| Had a go at degree day modelling. |
No you haven't, you've drawn an inexplicably upside down graph of average temperature.
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snowHeads are a friendly bunch.
snowHeads are a friendly bunch.
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| Winterhighland wrote: |
| Quote: |
| Had a go at degree day modelling. |
No you haven't, you've drawn an inexplicably upside down graph of average temperature. |
It uses degree day data which I then re-based to freezing, I did "have a go", may have got it wrong though and ended up with an upside-down average temperature graph 
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And love to help out and answer questions and of course, read each other's snow reports.
And love to help out and answer questions and of course, read each other's snow reports.
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mr_big_ad, I was up at Moel Sych today. All good and quite plausible to imagine a couple of lifts and a few runs.
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just need a little mountain train running up to Llyn Lluncaws for the lazy summer visitors and we're rolling!
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You know it makes sense.
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| AndAnotherThing.. wrote: |
| mr_big_ad, I was up at Moel Sych today. All good and quite plausible to imagine a couple of lifts and a few runs. |
Ahhh if only...I see Harwood Ski Club ran the other day once the winds had died down
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Otherwise you'll just go on seeing the one name:
Otherwise you'll just go on seeing the one name:
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Fantasy time.......
After a fantastic opening weekend with all lifts running and 10/14 pistes open, the week leading up to Christmas is going to bring warm weather, but fortunately not too much rain.
Monday morning will bring further snow showers down to 650m, the afternoon will see light rain at all levels.
Tuesday looks to be an excellent day with cold temperatures light winds and blue skies.
Wednesday-Thursday will be warm and windy so we expect to lose most of the snow cover on the west and south facing runs.
Friday into Saturday sees a return to colder weather with a sprinkling of fresh snow on the runs above gregs hut.
Ski Cross Fell will be closed on Christmas day and Boxing day.
back to my padded cell......
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Poster: A snowHead
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Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
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I have done some back of fag packet costs...
10 Lifts £20M
25Km of Runs with snow fencing £0.75M
Car Parking for 500 cars. £1.0M
1.5KM access Road £1.5M
1 IDE Snow Maker £1.5M
2 Artificial Lakes £0.75M
2.5Km Funitel with stop at 680m £32M
10 Ratnik Air/Water snow cannons £0.1M
Visitors Centre and additional facilities £2.4M
Total £60M
120,000 skiier days/year at average spend of £40 each
income £4.8M/year
Less estimatedoperational costs, payback of approximately 16 years
who's in?
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Well, the person's real but it's just a made up name, see?
Well, the person's real but it's just a made up name, see?
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| mr_big_ad wrote: |
I have done some back of fag packet costs...
10 Lifts £20M
25Km of Runs with snow fencing £0.75M
Car Parking for 500 cars. £1.0M
1.5KM access Road £1.5M
1 IDE Snow Maker £1.5M
2 Artificial Lakes £0.75M
2.5Km Funitel with stop at 680m £32M
10 Ratnik Air/Water snow cannons £0.1M
Visitors Centre and additional facilities £2.4M
Total £60M
120,000 skiier days/year at average spend of £40 each
income £4.8M/year
Less estimatedoperational costs, payback of approximately 16 years
who's in? |
Plus whatever income you can generate from the funitel during the summer for down hill cyclists!
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You need to Login to know who's really who.
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Anyway, snowHeads is much more fun if you do.
Anyway, snowHeads is much more fun if you do.
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Love it!
definately need that euromillions win!
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You'll need to Register first of course.
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Something to draw inspiration from would be the skiing in Belgium. Type ski Belgium into youtube, great video of a 75cm day at Ovifat, one of their ski centres. Likely they have been able to have ski centres largely due to the fact that most of the terrain is within the trees. The centres there are small, I believe they use snow making also but no IDE. The weather in southern Belgium is similar to England.
Your site sounds great. In general though a lot of English/Whelsh terrain isn't in forest, is this because of significant deforestation or are the treelines naturally low?
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The way to fund this is to base the business plan on lift's to serve mountain biking.
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You'll get to see more forums and be part of the best ski club on the net.
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It would theoretically be possible to get the treeline up to 900m around cross fell, but the growth would be very slow. I thought it would be a good idea to re-populate the area with native trees and shrubs in strategic locations, both to shelter from the wind/sun, but also to add interest and encourage wildlife as interest to summer visitors.
Fortunately, a report has just been published about the future development of Scottish ski centres, a lot of it would apply to cross fell.
http://www.hie.co.uk/common/handlers/download-document.ashx?id=094fea5b-058e-419c-91ee-f64448e7da5c
Perhaps even more important that the IDE snowmaker, in terms of a viable business would be the main access from the valley floor. I believe that the only viable option due to the length, terrain and height gain would be a funitel (not a gondola) Nevis range has great conditions at the moment, but it appears that the operations are being severely affected by wind. The gondona has been closed much of the week. A funitel uses two cables, and so is stable in winds of up to 100km/hr. the west facing slope is often going to be affected by high winds due to the unique topography. Therefore a chairlift on the west facing slope would be impractical. Therefore I would propose a funitel with a mid station stop at 680m, this would give a 200m drop from the top of the mountain on the slopes that in easterly snow setups, would offer the best conditions.
The funitel would allow downhill cyclists, hill walkers and disabled people access in most weather conditions.
The pennine way crosses cross fell, and the walkers coulld be an additional source of income during the summer, if a cafe was located up high.
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| Quote: |
| The way to fund this is to base the business plan on lift's to serve mountain biking. |
+1
Mountain biking is booming at the moment and the few places where lift served trails are available are very popular. The mountain biking would pay the bills and for the short period in the winter when conditions were right you would have the infrastructure ready to accept skiers.
After seeing what a destination fort william is for mountain biking i'm surprised how slow on the uptake some of the other Scottish resorts are.
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snowHeads are a friendly bunch.
snowHeads are a friendly bunch.
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Yep mountain biking was the way forward, having visited North Wales in the summer for the first time I was surprised with the lack of biking places. Thought the place was brilliant though.
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And love to help out and answer questions and of course, read each other's snow reports.
And love to help out and answer questions and of course, read each other's snow reports.
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mrpugster,
I did think this place would be a good place to put a small ski area in.
http://www.coedllandegla.com/
http://www.coedllandegla.com/images/ZZ_1245852882_IMG_1544.jpg
It has a lake for water and shelter from the sun from pine trees and north facing slopes.
top of the hill only 560m though, so not masses of natural snowfall.
It would be a MUCH cheaper proposal, as the shelter from the trees would mean you could get away with a single chairlift, which if it has bike carrying attachments, could be used all year round.
Much cheaper proposal, maybe only £5M.
There is room for cheap expansion at the top of the hill where the forest stops. This area would be suitable for surface lifts to be installed to cater for very busy periods when there is heavy snowfall.
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Yeah, you know maybe just a ski centre with 4-5km of piste and a vert of about 150metres is fine. Could be a good location.
Also
Another facilitity could be mountain boarding. A slope could be "sculpted" for that i.e kickers etc that when snow falls or is put down forms a terrain park as well as a mountain bike facilitity, could work well.
I think the problem with the skiing in Scotland is it is way too ambitious in size of centres for reliablity of skiing. They should significantly reduce their km of pistes and focus on keeping what they have running well with better lifts / possible snow making. But be strategic with the lifts so as to still offer good offpiste access when it favours. So the same ethod could be present throughout Britain, keep it simple and it becomes a more reliable consistant product that is much better than over ambitious centres that are unreliable and un-economical or pipe dreams that never become a reality.
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You know it makes sense.
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Yep simple and start off small, keeping investment to a absolute minimum. Look what the indoor places run with, 150 metres and cost around 10 - 20 million? Can't say I'd ever see this happening but a nice thought
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Otherwise you'll just go on seeing the one name:
Otherwise you'll just go on seeing the one name:
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How about a true multi sport venue to maximise income - chairlift access, denix/snowflex year round slope, mountain bike tracks, and canoeing/white water rafting river all of which could be accessed from the same lift. Lake/reservoir to be used for for boating/swimming. Pumping station could be installed to provide snowmaking in winter and controlable water flow-flow for summer rafting - i'd go for a multi-sport weekend when you could be 100% sure of a full weekend.
Another income stream could come from corporate events and accomodation, would need to be a good split in types of accomodation - hotel, appartments, camping etc......
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Poster: A snowHead
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yeah, I mentioned way back in an earlier post, in Japan they have a slope or two in some of their ski resorts that are dryslope, similar to snowflex but a native brand, the material is also green so as to blend in with the environment when no snow is present. During winter, snow covers the slope.
A centre in Britain could draw inspiration from that. If a dryslope is planned well it can deliver a lot in a very small space, Sheffield ski Village is a prime example. If the matting is pure carpet like snowflex, snow can lay over the top. The use of snow making could bring snow to centres that otherwise would see little snow.
This is another option.
But for sure, I really like the idea of a multi purpose site. The more activities, the more lucrative the potential.
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Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
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Well, the person's real but it's just a made up name, see?
Well, the person's real but it's just a made up name, see?
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| mr_big_ad wrote: |
The vast majority of snowdomes have been built in the north/midlands, not one has been built in the South of England, |
A strange definition of the "midlands" which includes Hemel Hempstead and Milton Keynes!
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You need to Login to know who's really who.
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| snowball wrote: |
| mr_big_ad wrote: |
The vast majority of snowdomes have been built in the north/midlands, not one has been built in the South of England, |
A strange definition of the "midlands" which includes Hemel Hempstead and Milton Keynes! |
I used to play National League Volleyball in Div 3 north - Div1 and Div2 were national, Div3 was regionalised.
We played teams in Chelmsford and Pontypridd. Even in nightmares, I can't imagine that CHelmsford could be considered "north".
I think they started Div3 south at the coast and Div 3 north at the border then added teams by working north / south respectively until the teams were all allocated
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Anyway, snowHeads is much more fun if you do.
Anyway, snowHeads is much more fun if you do.
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You'll need to Register first of course.
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| snowball wrote: |
| mr_big_ad wrote: |
The vast majority of snowdomes have been built in the north/midlands, not one has been built in the South of England, |
A strange definition of the "midlands" which includes Hemel Hempstead and Milton Keynes! |
And also the one near Ipswich which now has full approval.
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Broken ?
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You'll get to see more forums and be part of the best ski club on the net.
You'll get to see more forums and be part of the best ski club on the net.
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With Successful snowmaking at Cairngorm making a massive difference this weekend, and snow making even being tried in Halifax, Cross Fell ski resort will soon be taking off!
http://www.yadmoss.co.uk/
my piggy bank is still £24.9999M short of this getting moving, donations welcome.....
Harwood Sadly closing this year 
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FAQ
