Italy's long standing biggest ski region, Dolomiti Superski, established back in 1974, says its member lift companies are investing around €100 million in infrastructure upgrades, ahead of the 2019-20 ski season which kicks off there on 30th November.
"Ski areas are renewing and replacing obsolete lift facilities, creating new slopes in existing ski areas, optimising connections between ski areas and strengthening snow making to allow skiers to ski even when the weather is not ideal," the region's Diego Clara commented.
Despite the new runs, like other ski regions Dolomiti Superski will stick to its existing area stats of:
12 Ski areas, 450 lifts, 1200km of groomed piste, 1,160km of snowmaking coverage (97%), 58 snow parks and similar, 670,000 persons/hour uplift capacity and 320 piste groomers. Oh and the area covered remains at 3,000 km²
The big ticket items on that €100m shopping list are mostly new lifts replacing facilities which had reached their sell by date with newer ones to guarantee comfort, safety and a faster service. However Mr Clara also said around a third of the total spend has gone on snowmaking improvements.
This is the case of the Cortina d'Ampezzo (new gondola), Kronplatz (new gondola), Alta Badia (new 6 seat chairlift), Val Gardena/Alpe di Siusi (new gondola and 6 seat chairlift), Obereggen (new 8 seat chairlift), 3 Peaks Dolomites (new gondola) and San Martino di Castrozza/Passo Rolle (new 6 seat chairlift) ski areas.