Cardrona's new Soho Express chairlift is spinning, with Doppelmayer in final testing mode of the high-speed six-seater chairlift ahead of handover later this month.

Cardona Alpine Resort & Treble Cone general manager Laura Hedley said she expects the lift to be operational by June 28, two weeks after the skifield opens for the 2025 winter season.

"They're just finishing commissioning it now, with the electrical engineers, getting those chairs on the line and spinning it," Laura said.

"We're expecting handover about mid-May.

"We'll do our training with our teams ... once we're confident and capable on that, we're good to go. We're aiming for the start of the school holidays."

Soho Basin has 150ha of skiable terrain, the equivalent of 150 rugby fields. The lift project will increase Cardrona's ski area from 465ha to 615ha – making it the biggest commercial ski area in New Zealand.

"It's quite hard to comprehend when you talk about the numbers but when you stand out there ... it is just a huge basin," Laura said.

The Soho ski area will rely on nature for its snow this season. Snowmaking infrastructure will be added to the basin for season 2026.

Soho Express has capacity for 3,000 passengers per hour, on 75 chairs along 1,237m and a vertical rise of 379m. It has 11 towers and is the same model as the $23M Shadow Basin chairlift, installed last summer by Doppelmayer at NZSki's Queenstown skifield The Remarkables.

Doppelmayer is also installing a T-Bar chairlift at Cardrona in the main basin for the 2025 season, between the existing McDougalls and Whitestar chairlifts alongside the terrain park.

Read more: New lift for Cardrona’s terrain park