Ski resorts expect a lot of guests: This is how you can avoid long queues

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Skiers can look forward to the weekend: There will be sunshine and freezing temperatures. Fresh snow fell in many places throughout the week. Conditions on the slopes couldn’t have been better. Hundreds of thousands of winter sports enthusiasts in the country will want to benefit from this. Expectations are likely to wane a bit as you queue. Ski areas are expecting a huge influx of guests this weekend, a small Blick survey shows.

Markus Oppliger (64), Chairman-CEO of the Pizol ski area, has already experienced a large influx of guests this past weekend and expects a “pleasant number of guests” on Saturday and Sunday as well. Last Saturday, guests at the bottom of the valley at Wangs SG sometimes had to wait in line for 45 minutes. Two feeder cable cars in Wangs and Bad Ragaz can transport 2,400 guests per hour from the valley to the mountain. “If there are more people at valley stations than we can ‘carry’, short wait times cannot be ruled out,” says Oppliger.

Mountain railways cannot adapt their expensive infrastructure to only a few hours on busy days. There were nearly 6,000 winter sports enthusiasts at the Pizol ski area last Saturday. A record value.

Guests can reduce waiting time

Of course, all ticket offices would be open during peak hours. Oppliger states that the bottleneck is not in cash registers but in carrying capacities. The mountain railway boss also offers a tip on how winter sports enthusiasts can help reduce waiting times. “Of course, it is best for guests to book their tickets online.” This is even cheaper than at checkout. Also helpful: Guests think in advance which tickets they want to purchase at the box office.

If you are waiting in line for a long time, you can take the opportunity to get information from the ticket office about the conditions, where the red or black tracks are, or when public transportation departs in the evening. “While our cashiers are happy to provide advice, assistance and information to guests, subsequent guests are less receptive to people asking endless questions and seeking advice,” says Oppliger. Once you reach the ski area, waiting times will no longer be a problem. Then skiers will be well dispersed thanks to the many facilities.

“We need to prepare well”

St. At the Flumserberg ski area in the canton of St. Gallen, more than 10,000 guests flocked to the ski slopes over the last few weekends. “We must be well prepared,” says CEO Mario Bislin, 65. With the onset of winter, guests began to be disturbed by long waiting times. The management took various measures.

The ski area has been staffed on weekends for two weeks. These allow those with tickets to queue directly on the train, while those without a queue queue at the ticket office. Most guests at Flumserberg currently purchase their ski passes at the checkout. If you book online you can significantly shorten your wait time.

Bislin says staff also make sure the gondolas on the three feeder lifts are always full. Therefore, weekends are less suitable for romantic gondola rides with intimate company. The staff also checks that all seats on the ski lifts in the ski area are occupied.

In Flims Lax Falera, majority read books online

Peak times demand everything from the mountain railways in terms of logistics. “After all, it’s always difficult to predict how many guests will arrive and when,” says Bislin. In this way, human resources can be well coordinated with public transport providers. However, many guests travel by car. And especially with these, large morning crowds on certain days can greatly detract from the experience. “Today, guests are deciding to go on a ski trip much more spontaneously than before,” says the CEO.

In response to the request, the media office said that initiatives were being taken to promote digital pre-sales at an early stage using a dynamic pricing model at the Flims Laax Falera ski area in the canton of Graubeğen. This allows mountain railroads to better estimate how many guests they can expect. And skiers don’t have to wait in line at the checkout. The region now sells more than half of its ski passes online.

Are you coming by public transport or by car?

The well-known freestyle event “Laax Open” is taking place in the destination over the weekend. The railways are therefore expecting a “high volume of guests”, as the media office said when asked. Also good weather forecasts. Railways are preparing accordingly. “This means staff start work earlier so that operations can start safely and on time. Staff also ensure that fencing is optimized for column organization and that all seats in the elevators are occupied,” a media spokesperson said. If you want to find a table for lunch in a crowded ski area, you can also make a reservation using the destination app.

Although there are very large parking areas in the ski areas, guests can avoid the hassle of parking by using public transportation on busy days. If you cannot find parking for the Pizol ski area in Wangs, you can use the two decentralized parking areas with a shuttle service. In case these are also full, the railways offers a shuttle service from Bad Ragaz to Wangs. “We have enough parking spaces in Bad Ragaz,” says Oppliger. The Flumserberg ski area also uses shuttle buses when the parking spaces at the valley station are full.

Source :Blick