Clearing the Way

September 2009

Clearing the Way

A round-up of key snow removal equipment.

Written by: Tim Sweeny

Push to The Latest: No
Show in The Latest?: No

It isn’t often that a ski resort has too much snow. Still, when the snow finally stops flying—no matter how much has piled up—you better be able to clear a path for your guests. We asked several of the industry’s snow removal experts how they clear their snow and what equipment they use to do so. We also did some digging with leading manufacturers to find out what’s new in the world of snow removal equipment.

HEAVY-DUTY PLOWING AND PARKING LOTS
At Mammoth Mountain, Calif., the 2008-2009 season dumped 477 inches of snow. The job of removing it from parking lots and pathways falls to Brian Bethke, the resort’s snow placement manager. Bethke’s 10-man crew clears four main parking lots and uses some heavy-duty machinery to do so: four Caterpillar 966 loaders, three large Rolba snow blowers and a pair of snowplow trucks. A supervisor in a pickup truck coordinates the operation and assists the crew.

“We use the loaders with 15-foot blades,” Bethke explains. “Our snow is often quite heavy, and a large machine is needed to move it to where the blowers can get rid of it. We also use buckets on occasion to clear out snow storage and other clean up projects.”

The Caterpillar 966 and 972 medium wheel loaders are frequently used to load snow into trucks. “They have great mobility, which allows them to move from site to site quickly,” says Mark Sprouls of Caterpillar. “And their large bucket sizes allow them to handle large volumes of snow.”

Mammoth’s Rolba snow blowers originally came from Europe and are a perfect solution. “They are quite large and can throw the snow a long ways,” Bethke says. “Mammoth’s snow is usually dense and we can’t just shove it off to the side of the road or parking lot. The loaders set up piles that the blowers blow into snow storage areas.”

When you get hit with more than 500 inches of snow annually, as Snowbird Resort in Utah does, you’d better have the tools in place to remove or relocate it, even if it is “The Greatest Snow On Earth.” As at Mammoth, village maintenance manager Jim Baker says his crew also relies on two Cat 966 wheel loaders to remove snow from parking lots. In addition, Snowbird uses two Mack Trucks with sanders and blades. “We also use snowcats to push the snowbanks back. That way we continue to have enough room for snow removal throughout the season,” Baker says. “And we use an assortment of small snow blowers in the village.”

At Northstar at Tahoe, the snow removal staff deals with more than 350 inches of snow annually and 30 acres of blacktop area that need clearing. Garry Morgan, base area service director, oversees removal and ground maintenance. A 23-year member of the Northstar team, Morgan runs a staff of four operators; two are on-call and two are full-time.

Northstar leases most of the equipment it uses, to keep costs down and because it’s only used during the winter months. The area deploys three John Deere Loaders (the 544, 624, and 644 models), two with 14-foot blades and one with a 12-foot blade, to clear the parking lots. “I have maps with arrows showing where snow goes from and where it goes to,” Morgan says. “Mostly we use large snowblades to push the snow to the edge, then the blowers push it back. It takes a lot of communication during the night. It’s a lot like grooming the mountain.”

Northstar recently purchased a 150-hp New Holland tractor with an eight-foot-wide Westa snow blower for the 2008-09 winter. The blower picks up the snow that is pushed to the edges of the parking lots and deposits it into dump trucks that cart it away. “It’s a much better way to blow snow off to the side, rather than having to push it off the blacktop completely,” Morgan says. The Holland performs similar cleanup duty for the village pathways, too, making it a well-used piece of equipment.

Morgan says this snow blower had a huge impact in shortening the time his crew spent removing snow last season. In 2007-08, he says, “we spent five machine hours per inch of snow for 30 acres. This year is was four hours per inch.”

ROADWAYS
At many resorts, the task of moving snow includes clearing roadways. At Stratton Mountain, Vt., the job entails clearing 17 miles of ski resort roads, 1.7 miles of Stratton town roads, and 3.5 miles of roads in the town of Winhall. According to Marc Johnston, who supervises the road crew, the team consists of three full-time, year-round employees (including himself), and two more during the winter. (A separate resort appearance team is responsible for clearing Stratton’s extensive village and walkways.) In addition to roadways, Johnston and his crew also plow 26 acres of parking lots.

The roadways are plowed around the clock once a storm starts. For small storms, four men work the day shift and one works at night. During larger storms, three work daytime hours and two work the night shift, with the shifts overlapping in order to expedite the snow clearing. “We plow the roads nonstop until the storm is over, and it may take a day or two to truck the snow offsite to make room for the next storm,” Johnston says.

To handle the job, Johnston’s crew leans on a deep fleet that includes two Mack plows with wings and sanders, one International plow with a sander, one John Deere 672 grader with a wing, two John Deere 544 loaders with plows and snow baskets, one Gilmore rubber tire backhoe with a 10-foot plow, and one Mack tandem truck for transporting the snow away. Johnston says they use 3,500 yards of sand and 1,200-1,600 tons of salt per year.

The road crew doesn’t put away all that heavy equipment when the snow stops, either. “We also maintain the roads year round, helping repair water main breaks or sewer line breaks,” Johnston says. “And we work with the snowmaking department to repair or install new snowmaking pipes.”

CLEARING WALKWAYS
For clearing sidewalks and walkways, snowblowers and plows that can easily maneuver into these tight spaces are essential. Bethke says Mammoth uses smaller Cat skid steer loaders equipped with snowblowers along with walk-behind blowers to blow snow to locations where the larger equipment can get to it, then move it to the large snow storage areas. At Snowbird, Baker’s crew uses a small Caterpillar tractor with a snowblower on the front to clear paths between its lodging properties.

Indeed, Sprouls says the most commonly used Caterpillar machines at ski resorts are skid steer loaders (with rubber tires) and compact track loaders (with rubber tracks). They are used on sidewalks and small parking areas for dozing snow, blowing snow with a snow- blower attachment, and loading snow into trucks. “The small size and great maneuverability make these machines very productive in restricted spaces,” Sprouls says. “Also, the Cat high-pressure, high-flow hydraulics enables these machines to power snowblower attachments effectively.” Caterpillar also offers several track machines, multi-terrain loaders with very low ground pressure that are kind to sensitive surfaces, such as unpaved lots and grassy areas.

The ubiquitous Bobcat is also part of the snow removal fleet at many areas. According to Rob Gilles of Bobcat, the ski-steer loader and the Toolcat utility work machine are two of the most popular with ski resorts. “Both have the ability to use dozens of front-end attachments for a variety of snow removal applications,” he says. “The machines are also compact enough to fit where larger equipment cannot, so they’re ideal for removing snow in parking lots, on sidewalks, near buildings and around obstacles.”

At Stratton, resort services manager Jeff Cavagnino is responsible for keeping the resort’s three base lodge areas, two hotels and countless sidewalks cleared of snow. They rely mainly on three or four walk-behind snowblowers, shovels, and three types of salt. “We just got a new loader called a Telescopic Handler, made by Gehl, which scoops snow,” Cavagnino says. “It goes up 30 feet and extends out 20 feet. That will really help us this year with our snow piles as the winter goes on.”

At Northstar, the village area is quite congested, so a premium is placed on small machines that can clear snow from tight spaces. A three- or four-person crew handles the job using shovels, walk-behind Honda snowblowers, and a larger Holder tractor with a Zaugg snow blower. The New Holland tractor with the Westa snowblower then blows the village snow piles into one of Northstar’s three dump trucks, which haul it to the snow storage area a half-mile away.

Zaugg America may be best known for producing the Pipe Monsters for halfpipes, but the company also offers a deep selection of snowplows and blowers. Zaugg’s snowblower attachments range from 2.6 to 11.5 feet wide. Zaugg’s snowplows range from four feet wide, for small tractors, to 20-foot-wide plows used to plow airport runways.

With all the machinery available, the job of moving snow has become much easier than it used to be. There are still times when the best tool for the job is a shovel—but those times are disappearing as fast as, well, snowbanks in May.

WHERE TO SHOP
A host of manufacturers offer plows, blowers and blades of all shapes and sizes to help with clearing everything from blocks of avalanched snow to trimming the corners of a sidewalk. Versatility is a common theme. For example, The Boss Snowplows’ SmartHitch 2 System allows plow operators to attach and detach a plow in a matter of seconds. Curtis Industries, which offers everything from commercial grade plows and blades to smaller snow pushers such as tractor and skid-steer loaders, claims that its Hitch-N-Run snowplow system is the fastest in the world to attach and detach. Erskine Attachments offers a variety of snow blowers, including a rear pull blower, a skid steer blower, and front mount blowers that range in width from 60 to 108 inches. Northern Tool’s arsenal includes various tailgate salt spreaders that mount to SUVs, pickup trucks, ATVs, or even one-ton pickups. Some models are priced at under $1,000.

Plows are going high-tech, too: The Boss’ Poly Power-V XT Plow features a super-slick poly surface that lets snow easily slide off the blade, which saves on fuel costs and helps minimize wear and tear on the your vehicle’s drive train.

Take a look at some of the companies below for more tools of the trade.

• Ariens Sno-Thro series: www.ariens.com

• Blizzard Snowplows: www.blizzardplows.com

• Bobcat: www.bobcat.com

• The Boss Plows: www.bossplow.com

• Caterpillar: www.cat.com

• Curtis Industries: www.curtisind.com

• Daniels: www.danielsplows.com

• Erskine Attachments: www.erskineattachments.com

• Fisher: www.fisherplows.com

• Grasshopper Snowthrower: www.grasshoppermower.com

• Henke: www.henkemfg.com

• Hiniker: www.hiniker.com

• Honda: www.hondapowerequipment.com/products/snowblowers