Why Telluride Closed Gold Hill Chutes 3, 4, and 5

On this Telluride map, the topmost red mesh denotes the area where Telluride’s Chutes 3, 4, and 5 used to be open.

As we were putting together our Telluride review, we became especially intrigued by the closures of the resort’s Gold Hill Chutes 3-5. When these runs closed in 2016, it left a big gap in open terrain between Chutes 1-2, which are close to the lifts, and Chutes 6-10, which require a long hike. A glance at the stats didn’t immediately produce any answers as to why these closures occurred—while Gold Hill Chutes 3-5 were very extreme, they didn’t seem to be the toughest hike-to runs the resort had to offer. We went to Google for explanations, but couldn’t find much. In fact, one poor soul asked Telluride the question himself on Twitter, but received no response.

Why did Telluride do this? Are the chutes really closed permanently? Did a major event spur this decision? We had to know. And so the searching began.

We started out by calling Telluride ski shops, as workers there would certainly know the answer to this mystery. Unfortunately, all of them were closed due to COVID-19.

After our search through the entire Telluride Yelp directory turned nothing up, we called the Telluride Visitor Center. A polite employee named Jenny picked up the phone, and we asked our question. While Jenny didn’t know the answer off the top of her head, she told us she knew a ski patroller who she could hunt down to get more information. And so we gave her a callback number and awaited her response.

Jenny followed up about an hour later. She had gotten the full low-down from a head ski patrol friend, and we had our answer.

Gold Hill Chutes 3-5 in March 2020. Note the distinct lack of rope-ducking evidence on this day.

To the patroller’s knowledge, the chutes are closed permanently—with the one exception being they may occasionally open Chute 3 in the event of very generous snowfall. The reason why they decided to close the chutes was due to too many inexperienced skiers on them—these lines attracted visitors who’d done other Telluride double blacks and thought they could handle the demanding terrain, but ended up getting stuck or lost on it. While they weren’t any more difficult than some in-bounds Palmyra Peak lines, their shorter hike attracted less experienced visitors. This created a major pain for ski patrollers, who needed to hike any time there was an issue there. The terrain was windy, rocky, and narrow, making rescue operations even more difficult.

In the end, the resort didn’t have enough manpower to devote the required resources to this area while also catering to the rest of the mountain, and patrolling this area became more tiring than it was worth.

So while Gold Hill Chutes 3-5 are now officially permanently closed, it appears you might still be able to properly hit Chute 3 if it’s your very lucky day. In addition, the ski patroller said that some visitors still duck the ropes—while you could theoretically do that, just know that the patrollers won’t be picking you up if something happens!

While some may be disappointed by this decision, Telluride still offers an excellent selection of expert and hike-to extreme terrain. We wouldn’t blame Telluride if they stuck with their gut on this one. But if you’re reading this Bill Jensen and team, it might be worth taking a page out of Big Sky’s playbook. Perhaps reopening the chutes, but with triple-black-diamond ratings and patrol sign-out, could be worth a try?