B.C. Ski Resorts Haven't Hung up Their Poles
Flat skier numbers, warmer winters and aging baby boomers should mean the future of mountain sports in B.C. is on thin ice. So why is our ski-resort industry expanding faster than ever?
What are they thinking at Ken Fowler Enterprises? In September 2006, the St. Catharines, Ontario-based private-equity firm bought Fairmont Hot Springs Resort Ltd., including the small ski hill south of Invermere, from the Wilder family, and they aren’t planning on turning it into the next Whistler. While most ski-hill conglomerates are rushing to gobble up tiny mom-and-pop hills and turn them into huge four-season resorts, bragging about the deepest snow, longest vertical and steepest terrain, Ken Fowler Enterprises has no intention of interfering with Fairmont’s low-key, family-friendly ski hill. They’re even planning a modest expansion of beginner and intermediate runs.
Take a glance at the state of the snow-sport industry and any investment in the ski industry looks crazy. Ridership on B.C. ski lifts peaked in the winter of 2001-2002 at 6.2 million and has bounced around at or below six million ever since. Thirty years from now, according to the United Nations Environment Programme, only areas above 1,500 metres will receive consistent snow thanks to global warming. Fairmont tops out at 1,584 metres, and even Whistler Blackcomb’s top lift, one of the highest in B.C., peaks at only 2,182 metres. And baby boomers, the generation that advanced skiing to its pinnacle, are getting older and skiing less. The Canadian Ski Council says skiers tend to hang up their poles for good after 50.
On the surface, things look as ugly as a snowless run in mid-winter, but buried under all the bad news is the opening of Revelstoke Mountain Resort, B.C.’s newest mega-hill, and the promise of three new resort developments and four major expansions that are pending various levels of approvals and zoning (see "Great Expansions). In fact, millions are spent every year at almost all of the 12 major ski hills in B.C. on infrastructure expansions and real-estate developments. In short, B.C.’s ski industry is laughing in the face of a Bermuda triangle: aging baby boomers, global warming and flat skier numbers. So Ken Fowler Enterprises doesn’t look to be so far out in the backcountry. But still, what are these developers thinking? And how sustainable is this development bonanza?
Ask Oberto Oberti, a man with toeholds in three major B.C. projects, and he says there’s no end to the upside in skiing. “There are 3,000 major ski resorts in the Alps and only 50 in all of North America,” he says. That’s nothing when size and population are considered. “There is definitely potential for growth here, and the best location for more ski hills is in B.C.; B.C. could have five more Whistlers.”
Oberti, a lifelong skier, could be wearing rose-tinted goggles. His company, Oberto Oberti Architecture and Urban Design Inc., helped develop real estate in Whistler, drew up plans at Kicking Horse Mountain Resort, worked on the nearly approved Jumbo Glacier Resort for more than 15 years, is now helping Crystal Mountain near Kelowna plan a major expansion, and is in the early stages of developing a brand-new ski hill. He’s deeply invested in the future of B.C. skiing and says a big reason for that is the Commercial Alpine Ski Policy, developed by the province in the mid-’80s.
Lift ticket: A chopper at Revelstoke Mountain Resort transports heli-skiers to the mountain peak.
The ski industry grew up with the baby boomers. Fuelled by their rising wealth in the 1970s and early ’80s, the sector saw huge growth in skiing in the U.S. and Europe. B.C.’s industry was younger and slower to bloom, which gave the province a chance to learn from mistakes being made south of the border: resorts forgetting to plan employee housing and developers ditching ski hills and leaving town after making a mint on real estate. In 1985 the province spelled out a policy governing the development of mountain resorts. Requirements for any development included environmental and wildlife considerations, conditions for buying Crown land and a plan protecting homeowners should a ski hill go bankrupt. But the most important section was likely the performance-reward clause for infrastructure and real-estate development, which allowed the province to sell land to new ski hills at a minimum of $5,000 an acre or 100 per cent of unimproved assessed value for the first 10 years. After the first 10 years, the land price would be based on a sliding scale related to a percentage of assessed value, but was still a steal.
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