Snowsports Career Map

Sources and Credits

The Career Map stands on open data, public records and the work of many people. Every number on the map shows its source, its confidence level and the date it was last verified. This page credits the data and software behind the map, explains the confidence levels and says what happens to a report you send.

Back to the Career Map

Map data

  • OpenSkiMap and OpenStreetMap contributors

    Ski area locations, lifts and runs come from OpenSkiMap, which builds its maps from OpenStreetMap. The interactive trail maps draw the same runs and lifts.

    License: Map data © OpenStreetMap contributors, available under the Open Database License (ODbL).

  • Official resort trail maps

    Each official trail map belongs to its resort and its artist. The trail map window shows it straight from the resort's own website, unchanged, with the credit "Trail map ©" and the resort's name and a link to the resort's page.

  • Natural Earth

    The satellite style picture under the map is Natural Earth I with Shaded Relief, Water and Drainages, served with this site and muted so the data on top stays readable. It covers the lower 48 and Alaska at national and state zooms.

    License: Public domain, under the Natural Earth terms of use.

  • USGS The National Map

    Closer in, at cluster and resort zooms, the satellite imagery is the imagery service of USGS The National Map, muted the same way.

    License: Public domain, as a work of the US government.

  • US Census Bureau state outlines, via us-atlas

    State outlines come from the US Census Bureau cartographic boundary files, converted for the web by the us-atlas project of Mike Bostock.

    License: The Census boundaries are public domain, as a work of the US government. us-atlas is released under the ISC license.

  • Transit agencies, via the Mobility Database

    Bus routes and stops on the resort detail maps come from each transit agency's public GTFS schedule feed, found through the Mobility Database catalog of MobilityData. Routes follow the schedule each agency published, for the dates its feed covers, so check the agency for the current season.

    License: Each feed carries its agency's terms. Avon Transit publishes under CC BY 4.0, Utah Transit Authority under its developer terms of use and Greene County Transit under the New York State open data terms.

Snow and weather

  • NOAA NCEI U.S. Climate Normals, 1991 to 2020

    The snowfall heat map uses the annual snowfall normal of each weather station in the U.S. Climate Normals from the NOAA National Centers for Environmental Information. Each resort adds a small pocket of its own published snowfall on top.

    License: Public domain, as a work of the US government.

  • NRCS SNOTEL

    Monthly snowfall, powder days and snow density for many resorts come from daily snow water equivalent and snow depth at a nearby SNOTEL station of the NRCS National Water and Climate Center. These values describe the station elevation.

    The snowfall heat map adds the SNOTEL mountain stations of the West and Alaska. Each station's annual snowfall is the median of its yearly totals for the water years 2011 to 2025, worked out the same way from snow water equivalent and snow density.

    License: Public domain, as a work of the US government.

  • Terrain Tiles on AWS

    Between stations the snowfall heat map follows the ground, with heights from the Terrain Tiles on AWS by Mapzen. In the United States they are built from USGS 3DEP, SRTM and GMTED2010 data, courtesy of the U.S. Geological Survey, and NOAA ETOPO1. ArcticDEM terrain data were created from DigitalGlobe, Inc., imagery and funded under National Science Foundation awards 1043681, 1559691 and 1542736.

    License: Public domain for the US government sources; see the Terrain Tiles attribution.

  • Open Meteo, with ERA5 reanalysis

    Monthly temperatures, wind and sunshine, plus snowfall where no SNOTEL station fits, come from the Open Meteo Historical Weather API. It serves ERA5 reanalysis from the Copernicus Climate Change Service (Hersbach and others, 2020). Weather data by Open Meteo.

    License: Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 (CC BY 4.0).

Resort facts

  • Wikipedia

    Many resort facts, such as skiable acres, vertical drop, elevation and average snowfall, cite a Wikipedia article. Each fact links to its article.

    License: Wikipedia text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution Share Alike 4.0 license (CC BY SA 4.0).

  • Resorts, operators and public records

    Pay, season dates, ownership and the other facts link to the page they came from, such as a resort's own site, an operator's annual report or a public job posting. Ownership of Vail Resorts and Alterra Mountain Company resorts is checked against the companies' own sites and filings.

Rent

Each resort page shows a median rent for the resort's town in its Housing section and links every source.

  • Published median rents

    The first choice is the median of the median rent figures that rental sites and local publications publish for the town, such as Zumper, Rentometer, PadMapper, Redfin, Apartment List and SFR Analytics. The map uses the closest place with figures (ZIP code, town, county, then metro area) and names the publishers. Foreclosure.com figures count only where no other publisher covers the town.

  • Zillow Observed Rent Index (ZORI)

    Rent data: Zillow Observed Rent Index (ZORI), Zillow Research. Where a town has no published median, the map uses ZORI for the nearest ZIP code, the county or the metro area. ZORI is a typical market rent for all homes and multifamily, smoothed, so the map labels it Zillow typical rent.

  • US Census Bureau ACS and HUD Fair Market Rents

    The last fallbacks are the county median gross rent from the American Community Survey and the one bedroom HUD Fair Market Rent.

Software

The map runs on these open source libraries. Each license file ships with the site.

  • MapLibre GL JS 5.24.0

    Draws the interactive map and the trail maps. Copyright © 2023 MapLibre contributors. It includes code from Mapbox GL JS v1.13 and earlier, copyright © 2020 Mapbox, under the same license.

    License: BSD 3 Clause. Read the MapLibre GL JS license.

  • Chart.js 4.5.1

    Draws the monthly climate charts on resort pages. Copyright © 2014 to 2024 Chart.js Contributors.

    License: MIT. Read the Chart.js license.

  • Zod 3.23.8

    Checks every data file against the data contract before the map shows it. Copyright © 2020 Colin McDonnell.

    License: MIT. Read the Zod license.

Confidence levels

Each number carries one of three labels. They tell you how close the value sits to its original source.

Published
A primary source published this value, such as the resort itself, its operator or a government dataset. The link takes you to that page.
Reported
Instructors reported this value through the map. It shows only as a range built from 3 or more approved reports for the same resort and season.
Estimated
A model or a secondary source produced this value, for example climate reanalysis, OpenSkiMap elevations or a search result that names its page. The source note says how. Treat it as a good guide and check it before you sign anything.

When sources disagree, the map shows the value with the highest confidence: published first, then reported, then estimated. "Last verified" is the date someone last checked the value. "Not yet verified" marks a value with no source yet; the map leaves that space empty until a source turns up.

Your reports and privacy

Every resort page has a form to share your pay or rent. When you send it, your report goes to Formspree, a form service, and Formspree delivers it to Instructor Grindset by email.

A report holds exactly these fields:

  • the resort, which also names the email subject
  • what you report: hourly pay, rent you paid near the resort, or rent at a listed housing site
  • the season
  • your certification level, for pay
  • the housing site, for rent at a listed site
  • the amount in US dollars: your base hourly rate before tips, or your share of the monthly rent
  • a proof link, only if you add one
  • the date and time you sent it

The form asks for no name and no email address, and it sends no cookies. Each report is reviewed by hand before it counts. Individual reports stay private. The map shows only aggregates: a range appears once 3 or more approved reports cover the same resort and season. Proof links are used for review only.