Skiing Superdome for Llanberis??

"Utilising the natural layout of the site, the proposal aims to take in the quarry contours and landscape. The majority of the development's facilities will be below ground with a magnificent water canyon (below) and rock gorge under a modern translucent roof.

The real snow ski run is designed to complement the existing landscape whilst the hotel and accommodation units will be stepped down to follow the slope of the site.

Particular attention and emphasis will be placed on provoding a visually pleasant landscape treatment in keeping with the existing character."

see www.snowdoniagateway.com

01/7/03 Ski trac have pulled out of the proposed dome so the developers have scaled back the proposed scheme and are due to publish the revised details at the end of July. Apparently they have the designer of the Eden project involved.

31/1/03 as yet no developments on this story, the project is awaiting an environmental impact report and feasibility study 

Plans for a £150m indoor skiing super-dome on the edge of Snowdonia National Park were unveiled this week (21st February 2002).

Developers -Snowdonia Gateway want to build an innovative 55m high dome-like structure in an old slate quarry north of Llanberis (Glyn Rhonwy). It will be the size of 10 football pitches and house an artificial snowmaking system for indoor skiing, bobsledding, ice-skating and tobogganing. The development also includes plans for a 400-bed four or five star hotel, 50 speciality shops arranged around a Dutch-style frozen skating canal (!!) and an educational Antarctic attraction in which riders in four person sleds will take a 45 minute trip to visit a glacial environment. There will also be an indoor warm-water lagoon and tropical beach! 

The Australian company behind the technology - Ski Trac of Brisbane - say that it will bring mountain skiing indoors on what will be the longest indoor ski run ever. The slope will rotate in and out of a cold room where the snow is manufactured. The company say that the major advantage of its system is that indoor slopes need no longer be limited by the size of the building. Moving at a speed of 25km/hour the oncoming snow on the rotating deck continuously pushes the skier uphill as they zigzag down the slope. Despite the proposed building's size, only 20m of it would be visible above ground. The former RAF bomb store below the site will be used as an underground car park. The scheme could create 700 full-time jobs in this hard-hit area of north Wales's economy.

 However, locals are still reeling at the size of the scheme and, so soon after the announcement, it is hard to gauge reactions. The company behind the development is a consortium of six local businessmen and an overseas firm. There is nothing similar to the proposed project in the world at the moment, although work is starting soon on a similar project in Australia. A spokesman said they needed to push forward with planning permission soon as other sites were under consideration, including one in Sheffield and, of course, a lot depends on grant allocation. A similar scheme was mooted twelve years ago and attracted a huge amount of local opposition.