Ernergalen
A Valais ski area above Ernen, built in 1981 and shut a quarter of a century later; a British investor once tried to buy it for a single Swiss franc and then walked away.
- Region
- Valais
- Country
- Switzerland
- Status
- abandoned
- Year opened
- 1981
- Year closed
- 2006
- Reason for closure
- The operating company's board decided to close the area roughly 25 years after it was built. A British investor subsequently proposed buying it for one Swiss franc and expanding it, but withdrew, and the lifts were left in place.
History
Ernergalen lay above Ernen in the Goms, in the Upper Valais, on the terrace at Chäserstatt reached by a chairlift from Mühlebach. Three lifts were built in 1981, near the end of the Swiss ski construction boom, and the board of the operating company decided to close them about 25 years later. A British investor came forward with an offer to buy the area for one Swiss franc and expand it, and then pulled out; photographs from 2007 show the Mühlebach-Chäserstatt chairlift standing abandoned. It is one of the entries in the Lost Ski Area Projekt, a database of every ski area ever built in Switzerland and what became of it, assembled by Christoph Schuck, a political science professor at Dortmund who started it after going back to the Valais resort he had skied as a child and finding it gone. His research puts the losses at over 40 per cent of all Swiss ski areas ever constructed. Piste names, lift manufacturers and the exact closure date at Ernergalen are not documented in accessible sources.
Lifts
| Name | Type | Manufacturer | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|
| Mühlebach - Chäserstatt | Chairlift | The chairlift up from Mühlebach to Chäserstatt, photographed abandoned in 2007 | |
| Unnamed lift | Surface lift | One of three lifts built at the area in 1981; individual names and types beyond the Mühlebach chairlift are not documented | |
| Unnamed lift | Surface lift | The third of the three 1981 installations |
Sources and further reading
More in Switzerland
Location
46.4079, 8.1719