The ski season has become shorter over the last 45 years, according to a 2016 study from the WSL Institute for Snow and Avalanche Research and the University of Neuchâtel. They found that snow now arrives on average 12 days later in the autumn and melts around 25 days earlier in spring, than it did in 1970. As a result, resorts have had to find ways of holding onto their snow a little longer to ensure the survival of ski tourism.
Andermatt’s winter season is getting underway this week, thanks to a new method of preserving snow from last season. The Sörenberg ski region in central Switzerland has new lifts that will take visitors to even higher slopes, where snow conditions are more reliable, while mountain railway bosses in the Aletsch region of Valais want to create a new lake to provide water for snow cannons in the high Alps.
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