Looks like Timberline didn’t need any help from Unofficial to get the word out they were selling off 80 triple chairs from the Pucci lift at $500 a pop to benefit the Friends of Timberline and the Mt. Hood Cultural Center & Museum. According to FM101 all 80 triples were sold in under 2 hours. $100 of each sale went to processing and handling, so all told they raised $32,000 for charity. The chairs will be replaced by a high-speed detachable quad over the summer as well as an upgraded top terminal for speedy unloading increasing uphill capacity.
HERE’S THE ORIGINAL AD:
Timberline has 80 Pucci chairs available for purchase online only on a first-come first-served basis.
Each chair is $500.00 with 80% of the proceeds equally benefitting the Friends of Timberline and the Mt. Hood Cultural Center & Museum ($100.00 of each sale is for Timberline processing and handling). Before purchasing, please understand that you must commit to picking up your chair in mid-April. The exact dates are to be determined based on how quickly our lift ops team is able to dismantle the lift, but we will allot a 2-3 day period encompassing a weekend in April. Chairs that aren’t retrieved at that time will be resold. Unfortunately, we cannot accommodate specific chair number requests. Charitable donation tax letters will be given to buyers at time of pick-up.
ABOUT PUCCI UPGRADE:
The original Pucci Chairlift was installed in 1956 and replaced in 1987 with the current chairlift. This fixed-grip triple chairllift was designed to operate at 1,800 pph but was lowered to 1,330 pph due to loading and unloading problems. It is the oldest lift in the network. The Pucci Chairlift services beginner and novice terrain with some lower intermediate terrain. The top terminal of the Pucci Chairlift is located south of the Timberline Lodge and west of Wy’East Day Lodge
The Pucci Chairlift will be replaced as a detachable quad with an hourly capacity of 1,800 pph. The chairlift replacement would use the existing lift corridor, resulting in the same slope length and elevation gain as the existing lift and would use eleven out of the twelve existing lift towers. The replacement would add two new towers: one adjacent to the top terminal and the other near the bottom terminal.
The replacement will facilitate easier and more efficient loading and unloading, which will result in fewer chairlift stoppages due to misloading. The chairlift ride will also be faster than the current lift, reducing ride time from approximately 6.5 minutes to 4.5 minutes. In addition, as the Pucci Chairlift serves as a “step up” from the beginner terrain, providing a more user-friendly chairlift will enhance the beginner and intermediate skier/snowboarder experience. Due to the slight increase in Pucci Chairlift’s hourly capacity, overall resort capacity will increase slightly from 3,990 to 4,030 guests following the Pucci Chairlift replacement.
