Mt Hood Meadows: Schneevorhersage

A good local area for the metro Portland community. Unfortunately, suffers from operations/logistics problems that prevent chairs from opening in a timely fashion, creating serious lifeline bottlenecks and mad dashes as terrain opens later in the day. Terrain is ok. Short steeps, moderate length rolling cruisers. The tree skiing in PR and surrounding area is fantastic when open but challenging to navigate for the uninitiated and tree-well danger is very real (ski with a partner). Heather and Clark offer some longer steeper “bowl-like” terrain but patrol staff seem to have a hard time getting these areas safely open. Lodge was a disaster but likely would be improved with addition of the new building but Covid year will prevent us from knowing for sure. Ultimately, this is a great area for locals, but not a destination. That said, the management seems poor as the mountain struggles to get its terrain open in a reliable way which constantly pisses off the patrons. The ski school is also painful to work with which creates more friction with the locals that want this to be their home base. If logistics/operations could be improved, the place would be a joy. But, there seems to be little incentive to make the necessary investments in lift infrastructure, patrollers, and kind and thoughtful staff with a big city willing to roll up in droves every weekend day and any potential powder day. The management seems to know this and acts the part. A sad and frustrating relationship between ski area and skier. People have brought up whether Vail Associates or a similar conglomerate would buy the area and reform its operations. Obviously brings up lots of thorny issues but the fact this is bandied about in frustrated chairlift conversations in a region like the PNW speaks volumes about the area’s management problems.