Mount Sunapee's Next Five-Year Plan Is Mostly Projects It Already Got Approved
October 22, 2026
October 22, 2026
Mount Sunapee's new master plan includes night lighting on South Peak, Spruce Peak and North Peak trails. The state approved that idea in 2000. The plan also has a chairlift from the Sunbowl base to the North Peak summit, approved in 2005, and a West Bowl express quad with about 75 acres of new terrain, approved in 2016. None of them has been built. All of them are back in the 2026-2030 Master Development Plan that the operator filed with the state in June.
This winter's plan is a different document. It covers a gearbox, a staircase, a boiler and a shuttle bus. If you live around Sunapee or Newbury and ski the mountain, that maintenance list is the better guide to what you'll find when the lifts start turning.
Mount Sunapee sits on state land. Vail Resorts runs it under a lease with the New Hampshire Department of Natural and Cultural Resources, and the operator files two kinds of plans. The Annual Operating Plan, or AOP, covers one season. The Master Development Plan covers five years and lists what the operator might do.
The 2026-27 AOP was amended July 23, and the state gave final approval on July 30. Its improvement list for this winter covers:
The same document then lists the projects the state approved in earlier operating plans: the North Peak-to-Sunbowl chairlift and trail, the Pipeline Trail widening, replacement of the South Peak snowmaking system, a new Parking Lot 4 along the access road and expanded septic spray fields. A one-line note follows the list: "None of the above previously approved projects will be undertaken in this AOP."
That note isn't new. The 2025-26 AOP carried the same deferred list and said none of it would happen that season either. The North Peak-Sunbowl projects also show up as carried forward in the 2023-24 plan.
The 2026-2030 Master Development Plan includes a table of "previously approved, not yet implemented projects," each with the year it was approved. A few of them:
| Project | Year approved |
|---|---|
| Upgrade North Peak Triple to a quad | 2000 |
| Upgrade Spruce Triple to a quad | 2000 |
| Night lighting on South Peak, Spruce Peak and North Peak trails | 2000 |
| Cataract chairlift, Sunbowl base to North Peak summit | 2005 |
| Construct Cataract Trail | 2005 |
| Upgrade Sunapee Express to a six-passenger lift | 2016 |
| West Bowl high-speed express quad, about 5,100 feet | 2016 |
| About 75 acres of new West Bowl terrain, four top-to-bottom trails | 2016 |
| Telecord surface lift from Parking Lot 3 to Spruce Lodge | 2020 |
The Spruce Triple shows the pattern best. The state approved upgrading it to a quad 26 years ago, and this winter's work on it is a new gearbox. Night skiing is the same story. The master plan describes current conditions as having no night skiing or riding, so the lighting approved in 2000 has never been installed.
The new plan goes further. It proposes about 123 more acres of snowmaking coverage and roughly 105 acres of new developed terrain, including about 56.2 acres in West Bowl. It also covers renovations at Sunapee, Spruce and Summit lodges, a basic-services lodge in West Bowl, a 141-space Parking Lot 4 and a West Bowl lot of about 450 spaces. The 2026-27 AOP says none of those base-area projects will be done this operating year. The state's Mount Sunapee Advisory Commission page labels both the master plan and its companion Environmental Management Plan "Posted as Submitted by the Operator – Under Department Review."
West Bowl gets the most attention in any Sunapee expansion talk, and it has the longest paper trail. In 2016 the state approved a lift and terrain package there under conditions set out in a decision summary. Ski-area facilities had to sit on state land. Private or residential development on West Bowl lands was barred. The terms also set a trail setback and prohibited paths on private land that would give access to the public land.
The Valley News reported in 2020 that earlier West Bowl proposals had also included vacation homes on privately owned land west of the mountain. The paper said Tim and Diane Mueller, the previous operators, did not go ahead with the 2016-approved plan. In 2018 the Executive Council approved the West Bowl plan again as part of moving the lease to Vail, though construction still needed DNCR and local planning approvals.
Vail announced on September 27, 2018 that it had bought Triple Peaks, the Mueller family's parent company for Mount Sunapee. NHPR reported that at the lease-transfer hearing, Vail said it had no current plans to develop the state park land further.
West Bowl spans both state and private land. The master plan says the resort privately owns 656 acres, including land on the mountain's western flank. At the commission's June 23, 2026 meeting, according to the draft minutes, the resort's representative said it still holds an expansion permit but isn't pursuing expansion in its current capital plan. So West Bowl is approved, back in the master plan, and not on the near-term schedule.
The resort's wastewater system may do more than any lift to decide when big projects can move. In June 2025, the Valley News reported that local conservation groups and lake-area selectboards were urging the state to require replacement of the resort's aging wastewater lagoons. The state Department of Environmental Services disputed claims of demonstrated water-quality impacts.
The next step came in June 2026. InDepthNH reported that the Governor and Executive Council approved a $237,978 state-funded feasibility study of the wastewater system by the engineering firm Weston & Sampson. The firm's flows-and-loads memo, dated October 6, 2026, says the master plan improvements weren't part of the 2026-27 AOP and assumes they won't take effect until 2028. It describes its analysis as input for later work on treatment and disposal options, not a final fix. The expanded septic spray fields have been on the deferred list in each of the last two operating plans.
The state also lists the 2018 lease amendment for the change in control as effective through June 30, 2028.
The 2026-27 AOP plans to open on November 25, 2026, about four weeks after this post goes up, and to stay open through Sunday, April 4, 2027, weather permitting. Lifts generally run 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. on weekdays and 8 a.m. to 4 p.m. on weekends and holidays. Lodges generally open an hour before the lifts.
Last year shows how loose that date can be. The 2025-26 AOP targeted November 26, 2025. At the June 2026 commission meeting, General Manager Sue Donnelly said the resort actually ran from December 5, 2025 through April 5, 2026. That was 121 days in its 77th anniversary season, with 77 inches of natural snow. She also listed the season's programs: women's ski programming, Snow-Go, New England Healing Sports Association programs, New Year's Eve activities, passholder events, the Cardboard Box Race and the Slush Cup.
Pass prices on the resort's site as of mid-October 2026 were:
The pass page also offers a New Hampshire-only version of some season passes, good at Attitash, Wildcat, Mount Sunapee and Crotched, with no tax. These are live sales prices and may change before opening day.
DNCR and the regional planning commission scheduled a joint public hearing on the master plan and environmental plan for Tuesday, October 20, 2026, in the lower level of Sunapee Lodge. Both documents remain under department review. The state accepts written comments on Mount Sunapee matters at [email protected], and the commission page posts plans, approval letters and wastewater study updates as they come out.
The operator submitted both of its last two Annual Operating Plans on May 15. The 2027-28 plan is the document that will show whether the Cataract lift, the Spruce quad or the 2000-era night lighting finally get scheduled.
Mountain plans like these come up when buyers ask us what the area will look like in a few years, and Sunapee homeowners ask about them too. If you own near the mountain and want to know how the Sunapee and Newbury market is valuing homes this season, VTNH Realty will put together a current, local read for you. Request a free home valuation and we'll walk you through it.
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