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An updated management plan for Ben Lomond National Park. 

Ben Lomond is an important destination for those seeking winter recreational opportunities in lutruwita/ Tasmania (it is the main focus of downhill skiing in the state, which commenced there in the early 1930’s).

While most visitation currently happens during winter, there are also plans to expand visitation during the warmer months. The Tasmanian government is about to write the park’s first new management plan in almost 30 years and will consider environmental and commercial uses for the park.

In keeping with state government plans to continue to increase visitor numbers in national parks, a key consideration in the preparation of a new management plan will be ‘the opportunity for Ben Lomond National Park to become an important year-round destination’.

Continue reading “An updated management plan for Ben Lomond National Park. “ →

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Good manners in the mountains

Anyone who spends time in the high country will have seen the exponential growth in visitors during ski season in recent years, especially since the covid times. Resort car parks full, mayhem on the roads, rubbish along the access roads, overcrowding. This is our new reality, so it’s worth thinking about how we can make it work.

Firstly, we should admit that change can be hard. We love these places and are used to the way things are. Suddenly the roads are busier, the car parks and ski runs are full, even the usual campgrounds are busy with people.

Continue reading “Good manners in the mountains” →

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Contribute your ideas to the Alpine Resorts Strategic Plan

Here is a chance to express your views about how the alpine resorts in Victoria should be managed. There is currently a review of the Alpine Resorts Strategic Plan, with submissions open until July 6.

Continue reading “Contribute your ideas to the Alpine Resorts Strategic Plan” →

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We know how this story goes. But we could decide to change the ending.

We know that climate change is reducing the overall amount of snow we receive in Australia. The snow pack has been in decline since at least 1957. We also know that the loss of snow is being felt especially at lower elevations.

We also know that as snow pack dwindles and the snow line climbs up the mountains that we have already lost a number of previous centres of snow culture – like at Mt Buffalo where there used to be a small resort with ski runs, and people would ice skate on Lake Catani, while the famous Buffalo chalet provided great holidays in the snow in a beautiful setting. The old ski lifts at Buffalo have now been dismantled.

In the 1920s and 1930s people could ice skate on the lakes in Mt Field national park in lutruwita/ Tasmania, including at the famous Twilight Tarn and there was even a small outdoors ice rink on the summit of kunanyi/ Mt Wellington, above Hobart.

In the early 1900s, a popular ice-skating venue at the time, Pine Lake on the Central Plateau in Tasmania was chosen for the intention of establishing Tasmania as “the Switzerland of Australia” by establishing a “Ice yachting” venue (where specially built yachts could skim across the top of the frozen lake). Source.

The small resorts at Mt Mawson (Mt Field national park) and at Ben Lomond in the north east of the state really struggle to get enough snow cover to justify opening the ski tows.

Spring skiing in the mountains of lutruwita/ Tasmania was a thing up until the 1990s. Now good snow pack in the spring months is a rarity that must be grabbed if you have the chance.

Kiandra in the Snowy Mountains was the birthplace of skiing in Australia (as pointed out in this recent podcast from Protect Our Winters). Australia’s first T-bar lift had been installed on Township Hill near Kiandra in 1957. Now the valleys and hills around the old settlement rarely hold skiable snow for long.

Continue reading “We know how this story goes. But we could decide to change the ending.” →

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Cross Country Skiers Fight to Save Ski Trails at VCAT

The long running saga around plans to redevelop the ANARES building near Rocky Valley dam and close to Falls Creek ski resort enters a new phase, with a hearing in Victorian Civil and Administrative Tribunal (VCAT) starting on October 9.

The case is being brought by Cross Country Skiing Association Victoria (XCSAV), Victoria’s peak community group of cross country skiers, because they feel the proposal will ‘gut  Falls Creek’s ski trail network and will jeopardise Australia’s biggest ski race, the Kangaroo Hoppet’.

Continue reading “Cross Country Skiers Fight to Save Ski Trails at VCAT” →

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Perisher Volunteer Ski Patrol struggles to survive

Ski patrols – both paid and volunteer – are essential for ensuring mountain safety in the ski resorts. Volunteers at all the mountains donate their time, passion and skills to assist skiers, riders and other visitors to have a safe experience in resorts. Beyond staging rescues of injured people there is so much that patrols do behind the scenes, from assessing slopes before they are open to the public, managing safety on the slopes, and assisting with rescues in the backcountry.

But the Perisher Volunteer Ski Patrol (PSP) is facing an uncertain future due to the actions of Vail Resorts, the US-based owners of Perisher.

PSP say that: ‘Vail Resorts has made the shocking decision to ban the PSP – a specialist squad of VRA Rescue NSW (Volunteer Rescue Association) from operating‘.

Continue reading “Perisher Volunteer Ski Patrol struggles to survive” →

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Winter 2024 – the washup

If you were in the Victorian mountains during that amazing storm that passed through in the third week of July, you will have experienced winter at its best. In the Victorian backcountry we had already lost much of the base and the fresh snow was unconsolidated, but it didn’t really matter because there was so much of it. That wonderful and particular sound of fresh dry powder creaking underfoot as you weave through the trees on the uphill and that weightlessness as you head back down truly is magic (it always reminds me of that opening scene in the Valhalla film from Sweetgrass – When you’ve seen the season’s first great snow through the eyes of a child—you’ve known true happiness).

Then the blow drier was turned on, and we all know what happened next. Despite the amazing efforts of the resort groomers, the resorts started to close – the lower elevation ones like Mt Selwyn went first (consistent with what we expect from climate change). As of September 8 there is still cover in the Main Range and a few lifts are still going in places like Falls Creek. But basically the season is done – a whole month early.

This is obviously a huge blow for the businesses who are on their second short winter and everyone who was reliant on a full winter working in a resort or valley town. And, of course, it’s a drag for everyone who just wants to go skiing or riding.

Continue reading “Winter 2024 – the washup” →

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Solidarity on the Slopes: possible union action in VIC resorts

Across the mountain towns of Victoria’s high country, many people are employed through Alpine Resorts Victoria (ARV) which is a statutory authority which manages the state’s ski resorts. It was created in 2021 by merging Victoria’s four alpine resort management boards (Falls Creek, Mt Hotham, Mt Buller, Mt Stirling, Lake Mountain and Mt Baw Baw resorts).

ARV staff carry out many roles that allow the smooth functioning of the resorts, for instance road clearing, ski patrol, rubbish removal, communications and marketing.

In recent months, there have been negotiations between ARV staff and the authority over a new employment agreement that will cover working conditions. This has been happening as a result of the merger of the different resorts, and aims to ‘harmonise’ the various agreements into a single agreement. According to the union (the Australian Workers Union, or AWU), issues raised in these negotiations ‘have included inadequate conditions, lack of weekend penalty rates and the need for compensation for extreme weather shifts’.

Continue reading “Solidarity on the Slopes: possible union action in VIC resorts” →

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Protect Our Winters report: Our Changing Snowscapes

We have known for years that climate change is reducing the overall amount of snow we receive in Australia. The snow pack has been in decline since at least 1957. We also know that the loss of snow is being felt especially at lower elevations and will have enormous impacts on the local economies that have developed around the mountains.

Today Protect Our Winters (POW) have released a comprehensive update on the threats posed by climate change – to snow pack, the mountain environment and animals who rely on a thriving ecosystem, and downstream rivers, and also the impacts on the local economies that rely on good snowfalls.

Continue reading “Protect Our Winters report: Our Changing Snowscapes” →

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When will the snow industry get its act together?

All snow lovers know how bad last winter was. As Mountain Watch noted in it’s end of season wrap, it was one ‘that went out with a whimper, ending two weeks early for most resorts thanks to a low snow year, above average temps and hot northwest winds and the fastest meltdown in memory’.

‘How to summarise the 2023 season? Given the slow start, early finish, three-week ice age during July, spring temps and hardly any snow in August and summer temps in September it’s fair to say, as far as the snow totals and snow quality goes, the 2023 season was pretty bad’.

Of course we will continue to have good and bad winters (and fingers crossed for 2024!).  But we also know that climate change is reducing the overall amount of snow we receive in Australia. The snow pack has been in decline since at least 1957. How grim it gets will depend on how the world responds to the threat of climate change now.

Continue reading “When will the snow industry get its act together?” →

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Grollo family buy Mt Hotham airport

There has been much speculation about the future of the Mount Hotham Airport in recent months as the community waited to see who would buy it.

It has now been announced that the Grollo family has acquired Mount Hotham Airport for more than $6.5 million and ‘plans to develop residential accommodation for workers and staff at the nearby Mt Hotham and Dinner Plain ski resorts on the 105-hectare site’.

The airport is a significant section of higher elevation private land along the Great Alpine Road from Omeo to Dinner Plain/ Mt Hotham. Many in the community had hoped that the new owner (it was previously owned by Vail Resorts) would focus on building for the community good – that is, provide affordable accommodation for on mountain workers and their families.

Continue reading “Grollo family buy Mt Hotham airport” →

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Alpine Resorts Victoria takes on management of VIC resorts

On Saturday 1 October 2022, recent amendments to the Alpine Resorts (Management) Act 1997 came into effect.

Those amendments include the abolition of the Mount Hotham, Falls Creek, Mount Buller Mount Stirling and Southern alpine resort management boards and the Alpine Resorts Co-ordinating Council and the establishment of Alpine Resorts Victoria (ARV) as a single entity to manage Victoria’s six alpine resorts.  This has been long planned and with winter over, ARV is now starting the job of managing the resorts.

Continue reading “Alpine Resorts Victoria takes on management of VIC resorts” →

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