The Vermont Ski Areas Association announced at its annual meeting at Jay Peak Resort that Vermont ski resorts recorded 3,903,171 skier & rider visits, just 5 percent off of the ten-year average and 11 percent off the prior season's record number. Once again, Vermont proved to be a bright spot in the Northeast and compared favorably to other regions in the country where the overall national skier visit tally was down 16 percent from last year.
Despite low natural snowfall during the 2011-12 ski season, state-of-the art snowmaking and grooming enabled Vermont ski areas to have significant amounts of open terrain, often unmatched in percentage by any other ski state.
“The 2011-12 season stands as a testament to the resiliency of our ski areas and showcased the unrivaled prowess of our industry’s snowmaking and grooming capabilities,” said VSAA president Parker Riehle.
“The caliber of our 75 percent statewide snowmaking coverage means, for example, that we have over 1,000 acres more terrain with snowmaking alone than all of New Hampshire’s total ski area terrain.”
As a cornerstone of the Vermont economy, the ski industry’s ability to maintain winter conditions in a low-snow year helped bring tourism revenues in stronger than expected, with a combined year-over-year increase of 2.5 percent in collections from the rooms & meals tax and the sales tax.
