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T rying to judge a ski area from a two-dimensional map is vice president of mountain operations at Stratton Mountain
like skiing in flat light—it’s almost impossible to get any in Vermont. “Any night we don’t have to turn the snowguns
real sense of the contour of the terrain or depth of relief. on can save a lot of money for us. We’re finding that the tech-
But with the rapid evolution of three-dimensional (3D) nology can translate to a savings of about 15 percent of a very
mapping technology, resorts are now able to give their cus- large, multi-million-dollar snowmaking budget.”
tomers a more interactive experience, often before they even
hit the slopes. And an innovative handful of mountain man- The 3D mapping is also allowing Panarisi to be more judi-
agers are finding ways in which 3D mapping can have a con- cious with his grooming efforts these days, pinpointing deeper
siderable impact on mountain ops. The result—for those snowpack and spreading the wealth to low coverage spots thanks
who take the time to implement the tools and analyze the to regularly updated details about the snow coverage courtesy
data—is a significant savings in snowmaking and grooming of LIDAR (Light Detection and Ranging). This remote sens-
costs as well as a boon to overall resort sustainability efforts. ing technology collects detailed 3D “point clouds” on the earth’s
surface, often from an airplane (see “How is LIDAR Data
“We don’t have the system perfectly dialed in yet, but the Collected?” pg. 35), and increasingly with drones.
information 3D mapping is giving us is allowing us to pin-
point our snowmaking and grooming efforts and help decide The technology—along with the use of sophisticated
when to turn our snowguns on or off,” said Craig Panarisi, snow-depth sensors installed in Stratton’s Prinoth groom-
ing fleet—is making a big difference in how the slopes are

34 | NSAA JOURNAL | FALL 2015