NEWRY — Sunday River Ski Resort will receive $5 million to use toward capital improvements this year, resort spokesperson Darcy Morse said Monday afternoon.
Morse said that the $5 million was given to Sunday River as part of a new investment from their parent company, Boyne Resorts.
Boyne Resorts has invested over $40 million in the ski resort since 2007, including this year’s $5 million investment.
“Boyne Resorts has been super-consistent with giving us money to use toward capital improvements,” Morse said. “We usually approach our parent company with a wish list of things that we want to do for each ski season, and because of their investments, we’ve been able to create a lot more skiable terrain and improve our snowmaking capabilities.”
Among the capital improvements that Sunday River has planned for the upcoming ski season are the installation of a new conveyor loading system, which Morse said is a system similar to an escalator that skiers and snowboarders will stand on while the chairlift comes up behind them.
A recent news release by Sunday River said that the conveyor loading system will “improve the loading experience, reduce stoppage time and increase its speed by 20 percent.”
Morse said that the $5 million will also go toward funding a partnership between Sunday River’s Perfect Turn Ski and Snowboard School and Gould Academy in Bethel.
“We already have an existing relationship with Gould Academy,” Morse said. “The new program is essentially that intermediate step before kids aged 8 to 10 decide if they want to get involved in the competitive format. With this program, kids can learn the competitive fundamentals while experiencing the fun of skiing and snowboarding.”
Morse added that the instructors of the new program “would be a mix of the Perfect Team professionals and the Gould Academy professionals.”
$1.1 million of the new investment will allow for the purchase of 60 snow-producing “snow guns” and 20 controllable pressure valves for all of the resort’s water pumps.
Sunday River will use some of the $5 million to purchase two new PistenBully snowcats, which will help the resort groom its terrain parks.
Morse said that the new investment will have a major impact on the resort’s upcoming ski season, since it will let people “see things that they haven’t seen before this season.”
“Sunday River and Boyne Resorts are both committed to bringing more skiable terrain to the resort and improving our grooming abilities,” Morse said. “We try and look at things from the guest’s perspective and how they would experience the resort.”
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