Grand Targhee Resorts’ eventual South Bowl expansion will be trimmed down from their previous plans. Teton Basin District Ranger Jay Pence told East Idaho News that the reason for the reduction in the plans is due to a severe avalanche risk with this terrain that would be challenging to mitigate. The original plans were to have three lifts in this terrain, but now there will only be one. The average to the South Bowl expansion has been reduced from six hundred skiable acres to just two hundred and ninety acres.
This isn’t the only part of their expansion plan that has been modified this year. Cat skiing was also originally planned from the top of Peaked Mountain into Teton Canyon. After cat skiing was added, the eventual plan was to add lifts into Teton Canyon. In January, this plan was canceled due to public blowback. Grand Targhee’s modified master development plan will be published this summer, and a public commenting period will commence from August 2021 to January 2022.
In the meantime, major projects are currently underway at Grand Targhee Resort. In the 2022-23 season, a Doppleymer detachable six-person chairlift will be added to Peaked Mountain. Previously only accessible to cat skiing, the lift will access six hundred acres of intermediate and advanced terrain. The Forest Service previously only approved a quad chairlift for that terrain though, so the plans will likely need to be reapproved. Other current investments include an expanded parking lot, renovating the Teewinot Lodge, sixteen employee housing units that will be finished this summer, and a new mountain operations facility that is currently under construction.
Image Credits: Skimap.org, Grand Targhee Resort
