Originally Posted by Bones

Regarding ticket prices, I think it's a combination of supply/demand, the additional cost of snowmaking in the east and the tourist $$. Let's face it, there's not a lot of places (if any) in the east that you'd buy an airline ticket to visit. So there's not enough tourists paying $100 for a day pass to "subsidize" the locals, in fact they're probably "subsidizing" the snowmaking. Most independent places in the east are probably only two poor seasons away from bankruptcy.