Exec aims to stay ahead of the snowpack

CLIMATE CHANGE

Blackcomb in British Columbia, which boasts a vertical drop of more than 1,500 metres (5,000 feet) and an average annual snowfall of 1,170 centimetres (461 inches). Spending US$1 billion to add Whistler to its portfolio would, as chief executive officer Robert Katz put it, reduce “the impact of weather variability.’’ In other words, it’s a hedge.

For Otten and his partners, the stakes are higher. They have one project planned, which will, if they can pull it off, include the largest ski area in the Northeast and the first to open in New Hampshire since Bretton Woods in 1973.

The endeavour is a US$1.5 billion remake of the Balsams in the White Mountains, a grande-dame resort established in 1866 and closed in 2011.

Just 16 kilometres from the Canadian border, the Balsams for its last 45 years included the three-lift Balsams Wilderness Ski Area. It was popular and had great snowpack.

Otten wasn’t impressed, though, until he took a look at a topographical map and saw an adjacent 1,335 hectares (3,300 acres) with an elevation of 1,050 metres (3,450 feet) and a vertical drop of 610 metres (2,000 feet). Plus, it’s northeastfacing, an inviting target for the biggest snowstorms. Developer Les Otten, founder of American Skiing Co., outside the Balsams Resort in Dixville Notch, New Hampshire. He wants to remake the grande-dame resort, which was established in 1866 and shut down in 2011. He was all-in when he sent the map to a colleague and “within minutes of getting it, he’s going, like, holy sh-t, where is that?”

Answer: Dixville Notch, famous for being where some of the first ballots are cast at midnight in presidential elections. (Hillary Clinton eked out a narrow victory this year, four votes to two.)

More important, it’s really cold there in winter. The average low in January is about —18 C. Otten signed on in 2013, contributing US$5 million of his own money, and immediately took steps to buy the neighbouring high-elevation acres.

The founder of American Skiing Co., Otten knows a thing or two about terrain that’s best for sustained schussing. The company’s now defunct, but it owned properties including Vermont’s Killington Mountain Resort and Ski Area. Otten also has experience with aging real estate: The Boston Red Sox’s vice-chairman from 2002 to 2007, he’s credited with saving 104-year-old Fenway Park by pushing to renovate rather than demolish it.

The other investors are Daniel Hebert and Daniel Dagesse, both from Colebrook, 18 kilometres from Dixville Notch.

They bought the Balsams in 2011 for US$2.3 million and struggled to get the rehabilitation going. The vision is for a year-round condo-laden playground with a big winter-sports operation — a gondola, 22 lifts, 1,500 acres of groomed trails and 1,000 acres of glades. Construction is expected to start next year.

The website promises “more dependable snow and a longer winter season.’’

There are doubters, among them Rick Samson, one of three commissioners of Coos County, which includes the Balsams.

“If the project was as good as he says, he’d be turning investors away,” Samson said, pointing out that folks from Boston, four hours away by car, have a host of options much closer.

True — unless they’re up to their bindings in dirt and rocks, which many often are.

Ski areas have all manner of climate-change busters in their arsenals, from cloudseeding to downhill carpets made of grass or plastic, even ultra air-conditioned indoor runs.

Considering the drumbeat of rising temperatures, gunning for an edge by going north and up as Otten and crew are doing is a smart approach, said Daniel Scott, a professor at Ontario’s University of Waterloo who studies weather’s impact on outdoor sports. there are 17 places to ski or snowboard, while back during the peak 196970 season there were twice that number, according to the New England Lost Ski Areas Project website.

While not the only factor, warmer winters rank as a key determinant in the death or diminution of a resort, said site creator Jeremy Davis, a Saratoga, New York, meteorologist who has skied at the Balsams.

He called its snow cover “fantastic.’’

The idea of seeking higher and northern territory isn’t new. Four Canadian investors opened a resort in 2007 on Mount MacKenzie in the snowy reaches of B.C., putting their money on the strength of its 1,710-metre vertical drop and nine- to 14-metre annual snow totals.

A Toronto newspaper dubbed the deal that created Revelstoke Mountain “climate-change real estate.” That was about right. “We figured we’d be one of the last to heat up,” said investor Hunter Milborne, a Toronto real-estate developer. Earlier this month, Revelstoke was reporting a base of 121 centimetres.

Getting the brush strokes of the Balsams redo right hasn’t been easy, with various delays pushing out the original 2015 start date several times.

Otten said the wrinkles are now being ironed out. When you think about it, there’s no rush, really. In the climate-change game, time is on his side.