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Aspen unveils automatic lift gates

System reduces need for lift staff, removing passes from clothing

Janet Urquhart/The Aspen Times

— Lift operators toting hand-held scanners have disappeared at the entrance lifts at all four Aspen-Snowmass ski areas, but anyone thinking they can sneak through the new automated gates with someone else’s pass stowed in their pocket should think again.

The Aspen Skiing Co. has installed radio-frequency identification turnstiles at all of the lifts where skiers and boarders can gain access to a ski area — that’s 41 gates at 16 locations in all, said Ron Chauner, the company’s director of mountain access.

The automated turnstiles debuted at a few locations last season, allowing skiers and boarders to enter a lift line without producing their ski pass or lift ticket. The pass can be left in a pocket, the system reads it and the turnstile opens.



“People liked it. It was convenient and handy,” Chauner said.

The automated system doesn’t mean Skico personnel aren’t keeping an eye on who’s coming through the gates, though.



Lift ops man a computer terminal at a podium with a clear view of the gates. The computer screen displays photographs and pass information as skiers and boarders pass through the turnstiles. Just as they did in the old days, the lift ops are likely to pull a party aside for a closer look, sans helmet and goggles, if the customer doesn’t bear a resemblance to the photo scrolling down their screen.

“If the faces don’t match, we’ll pull that person over,” Chauner said.

The automated gates are part of the Skico’s effort to get customers onto the slopes quickly, he said.

“The people at the podium, what we hope is they become more of a customer service rep,” he said. They will, for one thing, be able to tell customers how many times they’ve already hit the slopes this season by checking the data displayed on their screen.

And, at Aspen Mountain, and the Village Express and Alpine Springs lifts at Snowmass, the lift ops at the podium can swipe a credit card and add another day of skiing to a pass or daily ticket. That capability also exists inside the lift offices near the Campground lift at Snowmass, Lift 1A on Aspen Mountain and at West Buttermilk — “places where there’s not a ticket office in the immediate vicinity,” Chauner said.

In the future, though not this season, guests will be able to hold onto a ski pass and purchase new days on it for the following season through an online transaction. The pass will be ready to go when they arrive, he said.

Aspen-Snowmass is one of the few “all-automated access” resorts in the country, Chauner said.


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