Whistler Blackcomb is a ski resort located in Whistler, British Columbia, Canada. By many measures, it is the largest ski resort in North America and has the greatest uphill lift capacity. It features the Peak 2 Peak Gondola for moving between Whistler and Blackcomb mountains at the top. Attendance at Whistler Blackcomb often surpasses two million visitors a year.
Whistler was originally conceived as part of a bid to win the 1968 Winter Olympics. Although the bid failed, construction started anyway and the resort opened for the first time in January 1966. Blackcomb Mountain, originally a separate entity, opened for business in December 1980. The two resorts underwent a period of intense rivalry through the 1980s and 1990s, with constant upgrades and improvements that were unseen at other resorts. By the mid-1990s, the area was repeatedly named the best resort in many skiing magazines. Intrawest, the BC real estate firm that developed Blackcomb, purchased Whistler in 1997 and fully merged operations in 2003.
Whistler Blackcomb was the centrepiece of a renewed bid on the part of nearby Vancouver for the 2010 Winter Olympics, which they were selected for in July 2003. Whistler Blackcomb hosted the alpine skiing events, including the men's and women's Olympic and Paralympic alpine skiing disciplines of downhill, Super-G, slalom, giant slalom and super combined. In contrast with Cypress Mountain—which hosted the freestyle skiing and all snowboard events, and was plagued with a lack of fresh, natural snow during the Olympics—Whistler Blackcomb had the second-highest snowfall on record with 1,432 cm (over 14 metres) by the end of the 2009-10 season.[2]
Over the next decade, Intrawest expanded by purchasing additional ski resorts across North America, before expanding into golf and other resorts as well. Whistler Village, widely recognized for its livable design, formed the basis of similar Tyrolian-inspired developments at their expanding series of resorts, as well as other resorts that hired Intrawest to build similar developments on their behalf. In 2010, Intrawest sold off much of its 75% interest in Whistler Blackcomb Resort via a public share offering.
In August 2016, the American company Vail Resorts bought Whistler Blackcomb Holdings for $1.39 billion. Nippon Cable's minority interest in Whistler Blackcomb Resort has continued throughout the ownership changes, by way of ownership of a 25% interest of the Whistler and Blackcomb partnerships.
Description
The ski areas at Whistler and Blackcomb are situated on two ridge-lines running roughly northwest to southeast. The two are separated by a deep valley with Fitzsimmons Creek running along the valley floor. The main base area at Whistler Village is located on the northwest end of this valley, where Fitzsimmons Creek flows into the larger Green River, which forms a floodplain running north–south just to the west of the village area. The Sea-to-Sky Highway runs along the Green River valley. The ski runs generally run northwest towards the village area, or into the valley area between the two ridges. A small number of runs are located on the south side of the Whistler ridge, where they run to the Creekside Base area, some distance south of the main Whistler Village.
Whistler Mountain is the basis of the southern of the two ridges, on the right when looking at the Whistler-Blackcomb ski area from Whistler Village. It has a summit elevation of 2184 m. The total vertical drop is 1530 m and 4757 acre skiable inbound terrain. Whistler is served by a total of 19 lifts; 2 gondolas, 5 high-speed detachable quad chair lifts, 4 high-speed detachable sixpack chair lifts, 2 fixed grip triple chair lifts, 1 T-bar and 7 carpet lifts. It also hosts the drive station for the Peak 2 Peak Gondola, connecting it with Blackcomb mountain to the north. There are 4 on-hill restaurants, as well as a children's ski school. It is served by two base areas: Whistler Creek also known as creekside, the original base on its southwest flank, and Whistler Village on its northwest flank.
Blackcomb Mountain is the northern ridge, on the left when viewed from the village. It has a lift-serviced elevation of 2240 m at the top of the 7th Heaven chair – Blackcomb Mountain itself is higher at 2440 m, but unlike Whistler, the peak is not lift-served. Blackcomb has a higher skiable vertical, at 1565 m,[3] but less in-bound skiing area at 3414 acre.
History
Early visitors
The valley area between Whistler and Blackcomb was first surveyed and documented in 1858 by Hudson's Bay Company men looking for an alternate route into the Cariboo area further north. Although little-used at the time, the route later became one of the many paths used during the Gold Rush at the turn of the century. Known as the Pemberton Trail, the route followed a path similar to the Sea-to-Sky Highway, leading past the Whistler area to the present-day town of Pemberton. In the 1860s British Naval surveyors named the mountain "London Mountain," but it soon garnered the nickname "Whistler" because of the shrill whistle made by the Western hoary marmots who lived among the rocks. Four lakes paralleled the route of Trail, the highest then being known as Summit Lake. However, there was another Summit Lake in British Columbia, and in 1910 the name was changed to its current form, Alta Lake.[7]
One of the first permanent residents in the Alta Lake area was trapper John Millar, who set up a cabin next to the trail just south of the base of the mountain. During a trip to sell furs in Vancouver in 1911, Millar stopped at the Horseshoe Bar & Grill for dinner. The cook was Alex Philip from Maine, and Millar invited Philip to join him for dinner. Millar was a storyteller, and during the conversations that followed, he invited Philip to visit the Alta area. Alex and his wife Myrtle visited what was then known as Summit Lake several times over the next few years, and in 1913 they purchased 10 acre of land on the northwest corner of Alta Lake for $700.
Major events
- 2010 Winter Olympics
- FIS Freestyle World Ski Championships 2001
- FIS Snowboarding World Championships 2005
- FIS Alpine Ski World Cup – 1975, 1982, 1984, 1986, 1989, 1993, 1994, 1995, 2008
- FIS Freestyle Skiing World Cup – 1982, 1991, 1992, 1993, 1994, 1995, 1996, 1997, 1998, 1999, 2000, 2001, 2002
- 2025 Invictus Games
Terrain aspects
Source:[45]
Other facilities
Whistler Mountain Bike Park
The Whistler Mountain Bike Park celebrated its 10th anniversary in 2008. Having consistently grown since its inception, it sees an average of 100,000 bikers each summer.
The Whistler Mountain Bike Park uses the Fitzsimmons 8 and Garbanzo quad lifts, as well as the Whistler Village Gondola and Creekside Gondola to shuttle bikers to around midstation, at 1,200 m. The park has 47+ trails for all skill levels totaling 250 km + of trails. There are smooth trails with gentle banked corners for beginners, steep twisty trails for intermediates, tight trails with jumps and stunts for advanced riders, and challenging trails with giant jumps, drops, and root-strewn terrain for the experts.
During the summer, Fitzsimmons 8 and Garbanzo are used for bike hauls, with select chairs having their seats replaced with a bike rack. These racks fit four bikes, three in grooves and one on a hook on the side of the chair. The bikers then get on the next chair which is a normal passenger carrier. The Fitzsimmons chair, the most popular on the mountain, used this system until 2023. The updated Fitz chair opening December 12, 2023 updated the capacity from 2 per chair to five. The updated chair features many seats, and 4 front tire slots on the back, as well as a hook on the side for a fifth bike.
The bike park has three zones: the Fitzsimmons Zone (the lower zone), the Garbanzo Zone (the upper zone) and the Creekside Zone. All riders take either the Village Gondola or Fitzsimmons 8 to the Olympic Station area. Then intermediate and advanced riders can take Garbanzo up further to the Garbanzo zone. Garbanzo riders can then return to midstation or Whistler Village, the base of the bike park.
Incidents
Quicksilver Express grip failure, December 23, 1995
The lift operator on the Quicksilver lift pressed the button to make a routine stop, to allow a fallen skier to get out of the way of the unloading ramp. Instead, the emergency brake activated, sending shockwaves down the cable. Grips on at least two of the chairs slipped, and caused chairs to slide down the cable and slam into each other. In all, eight were injured, and two were killed, in one of the worst ski lift accidents in North America.[46] The lift's manufacturer, Lift Engineering/Yan, entered bankruptcy after the incident in July 1996.[47] The cause was found to be a design fault in the Yan detachable grip. The Quicksilver lift was removed and replaced by the first Creekside Gondola. The other two Yan high-speed quads on Whistler, Greenline and Redline, were replaced with Doppelmayr high-speed quads the year after that, with all-new terminals, grips and chairs, and renamed as the Emerald Express and Big Red Express respectively.
Excalibur Gondola collapse, December 16, 2008
The Excalibur gondola had a major malfunction on December 16, 2008, when the upper portion of one of the lift towers detached and
Photographs
See also
- Garibaldi Provincial Park
- Jack Souther
- Little Australia
- Windows Vista
- Windows XP
Further reading
- (Stats), "Mountain Stats", Whistler Blackcomb home page
- (History), "History" Whistler Blackcomb home page
- (Look), "A Look at Whistler History", Whistler Museum & Archives Society
- (Walking), "2010 Village Olympic Walking Tour", Whistler Museum & Archives Society
- (Intrawest), "Intrawest Corporation Quick Facts", Intrawest Corp.
External links
References
- Mountain Info Whistler Blackcomb, retrieved January 3, 2023^
- piquenewsmagasine.com retrieved February 19, 2019^
- Whistler Blackcomb Ski Guide retrieved September 21, 2011