Since 2019, a new, larger cable car has been swinging up the Jenner above the Königssee. Even the major project worth 57 million euros did not save the Alpine skiing industry. At the end of this season, the heavily indebted operating company will finally stop making expensive snow on the valley run.
On Monday a storm will hit the Jenner. The new cable car, which opened three and a half years ago, only runs to the middle station, and the ski route from the mountain station via the Mitterkaser to the middle station is closed, despite a meter of snow higher up and still 75 centimeters of artificial snow in the valley. But this white band all the way down towards Königssee is already narrower than ever this season – and from next winter onwards there will no longer be any artificial snow there. Then skiing here will depend entirely on natural snowfall, and in times of climate crisis no one can rely on that for a long time, even in the Berchtesgaden basin. The tourist business model of luring alpine skiers to artificially snow-covered slopes has finally come to an end, at least on Jenner.