Resorts having trouble working out how to succeed...

[s3phis 0]

Originally Posted By: I'm Sexy

7-10 fold meaning 700%?

Yes. Basically, back then, when you looked at the slopes, you could barely see any white... and it wasn't for the lack of snow either.

[s3phis 0]

Originally Posted By: spook

that's an interesting point about the quality of the grooming ryoma.　at a bunch of different japanese resorts i've ridden, the grooming has been shoddy. you don't really expect 4inch ridges to be left in the middle of runs

Yeah, start of the season, we had some green groomers and it was pretty rough. It wasn't a huge issue on the green runs, but the 'intermediate' runs here can be suprisingly steep... and when the grooming is bad, it's really not cool.

An example of grooming is the Kandarhar course at Nozawa Onsen. As our competition course, we *have* to keep it perfect. If you groom fresh powder, it takes longer than something that's a bit wetter and already compact. The ski resort starts grooming around 5am, the resort opens at around 8:30am... that's only 3 and a half hours to groom the entire ski resort. When there's heaps of powder, it's a hard job to finish on time. They usually do a quick groom the night before and then a steady groom the following day. We have to make sure that the Kandarhar course is in the best possible condition, and that requires two steady grooms... but since the resort doesn't have the time, we have to do it ourselves. It basically takes 4hrs from 12-4am to finish and then we get the pros to do it again after. It takes ages and people don't/can't really get paid for the extra work that they have to do... but it needs to get done.

[Tubby Beaver 209]

what do you mean "do it ourselves"? What do you do for the resort Ryoma? Or do you work for yourself? Why can't they get paid......not enough money there? Interesting to hear the background stories

[NoFakie 45]

Hakuba is about 1/4 of peak I think. It was 1991 though, not ten years ago.

 

The upper part of the Nagano Jidoushado is only from early nineties. If you imagine four times as many cars as well, it must have been a nightmare getting to Shiga Kogen and Nozawa.

 

At that time, part of the road leaving Hakuba to Nagano wasn't even two lanes wide.

[s3phis 0]

The Nozawa Onsen Ski Club is, well, the club that manages the alpine/jump events etc. It's also the main body of the Nozawa Onsen Ski School. The ski resort is run by a publicly listed Nozawa Onsen Ski Resort. The ski school is a sub division of the company but the club that runs the ski school is not. The school and resort employs people from outside but the club itself is comprised of local (ex)athletes.

 

Responsibility boundaries for the resort is very blurred. I work for the school and do volunteer work for the club. The general objective for the ski club is to support professional skiers. In return, the professional skiers do what they can to promote and support the ski school. They also are the backbone of the ski school and manage the competitions and championships etc. So everything from the enrolment process to the management of the comps is carried out by the club members. While grooming is part of the resort's responsibilities, there's an image that the ski club wants to uphold for the competitions and it'd be pretty embarrassing to be such a serious club but with a poorly maintained home course. There's work that you're employed to do but there's a lot of work that's voluntary and it's not half arsed either.

 

Basically, when you join the club, people will put a lot of effort into supporting you. When you finish what ever it is you set out to do, it's your turn to support the next generation. The running joke here is that the Nozawa Onsen Ski Club is the yakuza; once you join, there's no way out.

 

However, not all resorts are like this. The only reason why Nozawa is like this is because the resort had a ski club before it had a ski school.

[thursday 1]

Great stuff. That sounds very local community. Live long and prosper.

[Tubby Beaver 209]

ah ok....yeah it does have a whiff of "Omerta" about it

[BagOfCrisps 24]

On the subject of Nozawa we found it to be a charming place and some very friendly locals.

[s3phis 0]

Originally Posted By: thursday

Great stuff. That sounds very local community. Live long and prosper.

 

And it gets worse... the uniform is all black with a white and gold logo on the back. At competitions, everyone's wearing their club uniforms and it's usually really bright racing colours... and then you see this huge alpine guys head to toe in full black gear. Everyone's pretty reserved around our guys ... but at least it's easy to pick out where your coach is XD.

[stemik 14]

does the ski school also teach snowboarding?

[s3phis 0]

Yes but it's still got more of a skier image. One piece of interesting trivia: we're finally getting more snowboard students than ski students... but we have a lot of maniac skiers.

 

We've got really good technical snowboarders as well as people who are good at freestyle. Noz was, however, one of the last resorts to allow snowboarders. Even Kandhar was only officially open to snowboarders two years ago.

[Jynxx 4]

Very interesting stuff, Ryoma - kun.

Full on experience.

Cool.

[SnowJapan 178]

Very interesting Ryoma.

For those who haven't read it, here's an interview we did last year

 

http://www.snowjapan.com/e/features/interviews-ryoma-ohira-working-at-nozawa-onsen.html

[thursday 1]

That's some very interesting stuff Ryoma. Thanks.

[thursday 1]

Who said Tokyu was scraping by?

 

They built Holiday 1 at Hirafu 2 years a go and it's reaping heaps of benefits.

 

Which resort has put in a new lift in the past 2 years?

[tripler 0]

Iwatake?

[BagOfCrisps 24]

Yes very interesting Ryoma.

[NoFakie 45]

Originally Posted By: Go Native

NPB and of course Tokyu have commissioned a master plan to transform the main road going up to the lifts in Hirafu (Hirafu zaka). It looks like it is definitely going ahead which is great news. For those that have been here and struggled on the ice and dodging cars going up and down this street you'll be very happy with what they have planned, including putting all the powerlines underground. We'll actually get views of Youtei from the village unobstructed by powerlines. Woohoo! And the walkways will be heated! Work should start this coming summer and the initial stages completed by the 11/12 season. This should really help to create more of a focal point in the village and a more scenic and asthetically pleasing space for people. For all my bitching some good things are happening, at least up this way

At least there is some thought going into planning now. Something that has never really occured previously in this resort.

Here is s a link to the masterplan if you're interested.

www.nisekotourism.com/files/MasterPlan/090327_Hirafu_Masterplan_E.pdf

32MB pdf (!) but that's a very thorough study that illustrates the specific problems to those who've never paid much attention to town planning. Its also a great plan. I hope it gets realized.

Together with a paint company, Hakuba produced a colour guideline about ten years ago. It split the town into zones and made recommendations for limiting the exterior colours of buildings and suggested things like hanging baskets and showed what buildings would look like in more sympathetic colours. One of the examples was the Daily Yamazaki conveni in Echoland. Not much attention was paid to it though, and I don't even think there are any spare copies now. You can see it at the yakuba though.

It is noticeable that the majority of foreign run businesses in town have small and tasteful signage. They are much better than the bigger-and-louder-is-better poster-paint-coloured Japanese ones. We buried the powerlines going into our house. It does cost more, but its better than having some crap dangling right above the entrance.

[grungy-gonads 54]

That sure was an interesting read (or perhaps 'scan' is more appropriate!)

[Metabo Oyaji 71]

Maybe they'd want to think about adding Chinese to the signs, too, given that CNY seems to be their peak season. Maybe Korean, too?

 

[thursday 1]

Kanji is Chinese. No worries there.

[Metabo Oyaji 71]

Hiragana and katakana aren't, though, right?

[thursday 1]

erm... right

[RobBright 35]

Originally Posted By: thursday

Kanji is Chinese. No worries there.

Well the writing style is Chinese true, but some of the meanings aren't Chinese.

[s3phis 0]

Difference between Chinese and Japanese is similar to English and French. It's possible to grasp the general meaning in the written language but it's bothersome. While it's more considerate to write signs in Chinese, I haven't really met any non-Japanese guests who don't speak even a little English. I think English is a convenient middle ground.