Brighton Announces Six-Pack Crest Replacement, First Ever Mid-Mountain Lodge

The proposed location for Brighton’s Sidewinder Lodge as it exists in March 2023.

Utah’s Brighton ski resort will be installing its first high-speed six-pack for the 2023-24 season, according to a release from the resort. This Big Cottonwood Canyon mountain is replacing its three-decade-old Crest high-speed quad with a new six-place lift in the same alignment, affording a more modern setup for the resort’s highest-traffic area. The new Crest 6 will come with a conveyor carpet to aid with chair loading, but it will not include bubbles.

As part of next season’s upgrades, Brighton is also constructing its first mid-mountain lodge just above the base of the Snake Creek lift. The new Sidewinder Lodge will offer food, drinks, and both indoor and outdoor seating.

In addition to these capital investments, Brighton is instituting a new parking reservation policy for the upcoming winter. No details have been released besides the fact that all lots will require reservations; it’s unclear whether the spots will be free or paid. It’s also unclear whether the parking reservation system will extend to night skiing.

Construction on the lift and lodge projects will begin this spring.

Our Take

The current Crest lift is Brighton’s workhorse lift, effectively serving a 3-in-1 purpose: providing access to Brighton’s out-of-base terrain, linking those coming from the Milly area with Great Western, and, conversely, linking those coming from the Great Western area with Milly. As a result, the lift is a huge chokepoint during busy times. A six-pack upgrade will be a welcome change for this busy area, and the wider chairs and loading carpet will hopefully reduce misloads during peak times. However, with just a capacity of 2,400 pph, the lift as proposed does not seem to provide a significantly higher throughput than the current overworked Crest high-speed quad.

We’d argue the bigger piece of news is the new mid-mountain lodge, which looks to be located just above the base of the Snake Creek chair. Brighton’s current mid-mountain facilities are quite lacking, with the only option above the base areas being a small shack with limited food, no seating, and no bathrooms. A new lodge in this area will make it much easier to stop in for a break for those in the Snake Creek and Great Western areas, and should provide much-needed additional seating capacity at the resort.

Not too many details have been released about the parking reservation system at this point, and it’s unclear whether the reservations will have any sort of paid element. But neighboring Solitude has had a paid parking reservation requirement for the past three seasons, and in addition to Brighton’s parking already being limited, the lack of any other unrestricted parking options in Big Cottonwood Canyon has really squeezed Brighton’s capacity. Traffic up to Brighton is a mess during peak times, and after the lots fill up, excess traffic is forced to turn back—and by moving away from the last first-come, first-serve parking in the canyon, the resort will ideally see these issues considerably alleviated.

Brighton is intending to start work on the Crest 6 lift project this May, but it’s unclear whether the lift will be completed for the beginning of the 2023-24 season. Crest is an incredibly vital lift to Brighton, and in the event the project is not finished by the start of next winter, the resort will be operating at a substantial logistical handicap. Several important lift projects were delayed this past construction season due to supply chain issues, so if you’re thinking of visiting Brighton early next season, you may want to hold off on committing until more clarity on the completion date is available.

Considering a ski trip to Utah this year? Check out our Brighton review, as well as our full Utah rankings.