Having the ability to ski all the way home after a day on the mountain is a rare and incredibly opportunity. Even if you have to take a shuttle up to the lift in the morning, knowing you can ski right to your front or back door makes a ski trip all that much better.
The difficulty comes from existing infrastructure. If you have to cross a road to get home, you have to take off your skis unless you’re alright with giving the bottom of your skis a nice rock grind. But there are a few streets in the Valais Canton in Switzerland where popping off your skis isn’t necessary to crossing the street.
These skier crosswalks use little rollers to prevent damage to ski bases, allowing skiers to cross the road without having to pop off their skis. It’s some of the coolest skier-centric infrastructure we’ve ever seen.
It doesn’t seem like it would be that hard to include snowboarders in future crosswalks, either. Just make it one, wider cross rather than two smaller ones, that way both skis and snowboarders can cruise across. It could be a pretty sweet feature to see at more ski resorts in the future.
