With the upcoming winter-sports season about ready to get under way, Inland Northwest ski areas are making or planning sizable capital improvements, buoyed partly by rising numbers of young snowboarders andin a couple of casesby visions of becoming year-round destination resorts.


The projects, which range from added ski lifts and runs to lodge expansions and new guest accommodations, range well into the millions of dollars, and dont include surrounding development activity by others that adds up to millions more.


Were getting pretty excited. Everybodys getting excited, and were expecting a huge year, weather allowing, says Brad McQuarrie, general manager at Mount Spokane Ski & Snowboard Park, located about 15 miles northeast of Spokane.


Probably close to a half-million dollars has been spent at the nonprofit-run ski area over the last yearnot including countless volunteer hourson improvements such as remodeling the main lodge, improving runs, and moving a freestyle terrain park to an area near Chair 4 on the back side of the mountain, McQuarrie says.


Of the latter project, he says, Thats probably created the biggest buzz around the area. The new 25-acre, mile-long terrain parkencompassing more than 1,300 vertical feetnot only is larger than the old one, but also now is isolated from Mount Spokanes other ski runs so its users wont conflict with other skiers.


However, those projects are just the tip of the mogul, so to speak, for the ski hill. Mount Spokane 2000, the organization that operates the ski area, is waiting for the Washington State Parks to approve some remaining pieces of a 10-year master development plan thats expected to have more far-reaching impacts, McQuarrie says.


Its a huge plan. It will change the face of Mount Spokane as we know it now. It would be millions of dollars, including for a new lodge, new guest-services building, and more ski run improvements and additions, he says.


Final approval of the plan could come by the end of the year, after which it will be broken down into specific projects, McQuarrie says.


The ski area has a year-round, full-time staff of about a dozen people, and adds 215 to 220 mostly full-time positions during the winter, he says. He estimates it averages between 80,000 and 100,000 skier visits a year, depending on snow conditions.


There seem to be more people staying in the sport. I think the different snow sportssnowboarding, things like thathave increased, so weve seen an influx of the younger generation, he says. Overall skier numbers have remained fairly level, but the nontraditional snow-sport enthusiasts now comprise about half of those who come to the ski area, he adds.


Schweitzer Mountain Resort


Schweitzer Mountain Resort, near Sandpoint, is about midway through a 10-year master plan to expand guest amenities and services. Its owner, Seattle-based Harbor Resorts, is investing tens of millions of dollars to transform the popular ski area into a 2,500-acre, year-round destination resort.


The company is in somewhat of a maintenance phase this year, spending about $1 million on relatively mundane items such as paving, roofing, and sewer-system needs, says Sandy Chio, Schweitzers marketing director.


Were taking a year to look within, she says.


Harbor plans, though, to resume heavier capital spending at Schweitzer over the next couple of years, including to add new ski lifts and to finish developing the multibuilding Schweitzer Village, which includes lodging, dining, and shopping facilities, Chio says.


While most other resorts lease land from the U.S. Forest Service, Harbor owns Schweitzer Mountain and various surrounding properties. The company has spent about $25 million there over the last several years, she says.


Since taking over there, it has remodeled Selkirk Lodge, rebuilt and lighted the now 50-acre Stomping Grounds Terrain Park, installed new lifts, improved local roads, expanded the beginner ski area, and added Idahos only high-speed, six-passenger chairlift. Among other improvements, it also has built the 50-condo, 75,000-square-foot White Pine Lodge, renovated the Chimney Rock Grill restaurant, opened an activity center, and enhanced the Terrain Park with a new area called Terrain Garden that includes more jumps and rails for snowboarders.


In addition to ski-in, ski-out guest accommodations, amenities at Schweitzer Mountain Resort now include three restaurants, two cafes, a lounge, a deli, a heated outdoor swimming pool, six outdoor hot tubs, two fitness centers, and a small movie theater. Within the village, there also is a day spa, a child-care center, several retail shops, and a mountain market offering groceries, sundries, and gifts.


The ski area employs about 75 people year-round, and that number balloons to as high as about 600 employees during winter, Chio says. The resort has averaged about 215,000 skier visits annually over the last three years. Were hoping for some growth on top of that this year, snow conditions permitting, she says. About two-thirds of the visitors there currently are skiers, and one-third are snowboarders.


Chio notes that there has been a lot of development activity on land surrounding the resort, and says, I think the housing-market boom in Sandpoint has benefited us quite substantially.


Lookout Pass Ski & Recreation Area


Lookout Pass Ski & Recreation Area, located along Interstate 90 at the Idaho-Montana border, is midway through a $3.5 million development plan that it launched in the summer of 2003 and expectd to complete in 2008.


It currently is wrapping up work on a 6,000-square-foot expansion of its 4,600-square-foot lodge that will provide space for expanded food-service seating, a new bar, and enlarged retail area, says Phil Edholm, president of Lookout Associates LLC, the ski areas operator. That expansion is expected to be completed next month, he says. Silver Valley Engineering, of Wallace, designed the project, and a Boise company is the general contractor for it.


Improvements last year included the installation of five new runs and a new chairlift, doubling the ski terrain, Edholm says. In later phases of work, Lookout Pass plans to install five more ski runs and a fourth chairlift, and build an addition onto its ski shop. As reported earlier, it also intends to construct a 15,000-square-foot building that would have about eight motel rooms, a restaurant, and child-care facilities. Currently, the ski area has no lodging.


Lookout Pass employs up to 25 people during the summer months, and that rises to about 70 people during the ski season, Edholm says. The ski area had 47,000 skier visits last year, more than double the 22,750 of the previous year, he says. Of last years visits, 42 percent were snowboarders, up from 29 percent five years ago, he says.


Its growing in popularity, and thats because all of the kids, the majority, are learning the sport on snowboards, he says.


Edholm is president of the Inland Northwest Ski Association, whose members also include the operators of Mount Spokane, Schweitzer, 49 Degrees North Mountain Resort, and Silver Mountain Ski & Summer Resort.


Speaking generally, he says, I think were going to have a strong year. Were seeing a lot more people coming to the regional ski areas now, due partly to substantial capital-improvements outlays.


Silver Mountain Resort


Eagle Crest Resort, the Oregon-based owner and operator of Silver Mountain Resort, near Kellogg, is developing a five-story condominium-and-retail building called Morning Star Lodge at the base of its gondola in Kellogg in the first phase of whats to be called Gondola Village.


The multimillion-dollar structure, which includes 64 condo units that all were snatched up shortly after being offered for sale, is expected to be completed next spring, says Silver Mountain spokesman Stephen Lane. Architects West PA, of Coeur dAlene, designed the building, and Keeton-King LLC, a Sisters, Ore.-based general contractor, is erecting it, Lane says.


The Gondola Village development is on 3.4 acres of land that Silver Mountain owns along Bunker Avenue in Kellogg, just north and east of the gondolas base. Skiers and other visitors to Silver Mountain ride the gondola 3.1 miles up the mountain to the ski resort, which has multiple ski runs accessible from six ski lifts, Lane says.


About a year ago, Eagle Crest bought the 1,500 acres of ski terrain on which the resort is located, which Lane said will give it more freedom to make decisions appropriate to its needs there.


Construction of Morning Star Lodge and Gondola Village is the first phase of an expansion thats expected to turn Silver Mountain into a multiseason destination resort that will include additional high-speed chairlifts, a secondary village, expanded terrain, a water adventure park, a golf course, and ski-in/ski-out home sites. A resort representative earlier estimated that Gondola Village alone would cost $14 million to $15 million to develop. Owner Eagle Crest is part of Klamath Falls, Ore.-based Jeld-Wen Corp.


Lane says the resort has been experiencing annual skier visits in the upper-80,000 range over the last couple of years, and the percentage of snowboarders within that group has been rising steadily.


49 Degrees North


Chewelah Basin Ski Corp. is in the midst of spending between $750,000 and $1 million on improvements at its 49 Degrees North Mountain Resort, says John Eminger, the resorts owner. The resort is located on Chewelah Peak in the Colville National Forest, about 50 miles north of Spokane and 10 miles east of Chewelah.


The company has extended one of its chair lifts and, in a long-discussed expansion, has nearly doubled the size of its skiing terrain by opening up an area known as the East Basin, Eminger says.


Next year we will build a chair lift that accesses that ground, he says, calling the opening of the basin a pretty big improvement that very possibly makes us the largest ski area in the state in terms of skiing terrain.


In other improvements, the company has created a new entrance to the ski area and expanded its parking lot, Eminger says. Also, its working closely with federal officials on a $35 million, multiphase project that realigns Flowery Trail Road, which runs from the Pend Oreille Valley to the Chewelah Valley and provides broader access to the ski area, he says. Among the improvements planned for later are a 7,500-square-foot expansion of the ski areas 22,000-square-foot lodge and the addition of six to 10 miles of new cross-country skiing trails to the current six-mile system, he says.


A number of the planned upgrades have been made possible by the U.S. Forest Services approval this past May of a master plan for the ski area, culminating an eight-year process, Eminger says.


He estimates the resort has a year-round average of about 26 full-time-equivalent employees, but says its work force swells to around 200 in the winter.


The ski area has averaged about 67,000 skier visits over the last five years, but has recorded well over 70,000 skier visits in two of the last three seasons and has seen a steady rise in season pass sales, Eminger says. The Flowery Trail Road project has opened up a whole new market. I now sell season passes to (skiers in) Sandpoint, he says.