11_Leitner News.indd - Leitner Ropeways

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ROPEWAY HISTORY & THE PIONEER
October 2006
LEITNER-NEWS
First chairlift in Italy launched a successful career
Col Alt & Erich Kostner: two names that made ropeway history
On December 24th 1947 - Christmas
Eve 59 years ago, employees
of the Italian Ministry of Transport
completed the acceptance
tests on the first Italian chairlift
in Corvara in Val Badia. The single-seater
chairlift was planned
by Erich Kostner, winter tourism
pioneer and spiritual father of the
world-famous Alta Badia ski area,
and built by LEITNER.
The history of the chairlift connecting
Corvara with Col Alt is
also the history of the economic
development of Val Badia and
its tourism industry over the last
sixty years – a history of successes
and achievements that are inseparably
linked with the name
of Erich Kostner, and a history
in which LEITNER has been privileged
to play a major role. At
the age of 85, Erich Kostner is
still very active today wherever
developments in winter tourism
are involved.
It all began, way back in 1947,
“The people were
looking to escape
from poverty.”
with the commissioning of Italy’s
first single chairlift. It was built to
replace a sledge lift, which had
been operating since 1938 with a
capacity that had previously been
adequate for the small number
of winter tourists on the mountain
at the time. In the following
years and decades, Kostner did
everything possible to equip the
whole area with the latest types
of chairlifts.
“The people were looking to
escape from poverty,” says Erich
Kostner, “and it was clear that
the future belonged to tourism
rather than to agriculture, which
could hardly be profitable at such
an altitude. So I set to work on
the lifts, while others concentrated
on the accommodations
and others went into retail for
the equipment. That got things
moving in the village.”
In this mood of fresh optimism,
Erich Kostner came up with the
idea of a new transport system to
serve Col Alt. He signed a contract
with Karl Hölzl, who was
collaborating with the LEITNER
Company at the time, for the
planning and the engineering,
while Kostner himself handled the
structures, including construction
of the towers, and installation of
the ropeway systems. The wooden
towers that Kostner decided
to construct for cost efficient
reasons are probably absolutely
unique in the history of ropeway
A unique feature in the history of ropeways: Erich Kostner’s timber towers
Erich Kostner was born in Corvara
(Bozen) in 1921. His career in the
fi eld of winter tourism, which is
still not yet over, began with the
construction of a single-seater
chairlift to Col Alt in 1947. Over
the years he has been the moving
power behind the construction
of some sixty ropeways, most of
them built by LEITNER. These installations
serve a total of 63 km
of ski trails and are located in a ski
interconnect with some 200 lifts
and ropeways covering the ski
areas of Val Badia, Val Gardena,
Val di Fassa, Val Livinallongo and
the Marmolada.
Erich Kostner was also responsible
for the construction of about
20 km of roads linking the heights
of Col Alto, Piz La Ila, Piz Sorega,
Pralongià and Boè with the val-
Lift capacity on
commissioning: 158
persons per hour
In the coming winter season
skiers will be using the new
detachable 8-seater gondola
for the ride from Corvara to
Col Alt. This is a replacement
for the quad chairlift built by
LEITNER in 1990. The gondola
is state of the art in terms of
the quality of the ride, safety
and reliability. It will be in operation
in summer and winter,
serving a site of historical
importance for the tourism
industry.
At a line speed of 6 m/s and a
line length of 970 m, the new
gondola has an hourly system
capacity of 2,400 passengers.
Erich Kostner
Bio Sketch
ley fl oor. In addition, he built two
mountain lodges and a mountain
refuge in the Vallon area at an altitude
of 2530 meters above sea
level.
The new 8-seater gondola
Today modern steel towers are used
1947 – Italy’s first single-seater chairlift
In 1952 Kostner became a founding
member of the ropeway group
within the Italian National Transport
Operators Federation (FENIT)
and in 1953 he established the
Corvara tourism association. In
1972, together with the late Gianni
Marzola, he created the famous
Superski Dolomiti, and two years
later he played a leading role in
the creation of the Alta Badia
ropeway operators association
and in 1983 of the Corvara - La
Villa - S. Cassiano ski interconnect.
Finally, in 1987 he set up
the Italian Association of Ropeway
Operators (ANEF) and was its
Chairman until 1991. On 1 June
1996 the Italian President, Oscar
Luigi Scalfaro, made him a “Cavaliere
del Lavoro” in recognition of
his great achievements.
engineering.
During the first weeks of operation
at Christmas time in 1947,
a transport capacity of 158 persons
per hour was achieved with
the new chairlift. But Kostner refused
to rest on his laurels and
therefore he decided that the
lift needed active marketing. His
ideas showed once again that he
had a strong entrepreneur ial talent:
“We had to attract the public
to the lift, and at first that wasn’t
so easy. So we started to plan
various activities. In the summer
of 1948, for example, we organized
a big open-air concert at
Col Alt complete with a famous
band from Bozen. That was a
big attraction for the region, and
to get to the concert there was
no other alternative but to use
Italy’s first single-seater
chairlift commissioned
60 years ago
the chairlift!” As a result more
and more curious people came
to enjoy the exciting ride on the
LEITNER single chairlift, which
at this time was an incredible
experience. In the early days
there were still a few weak points
in the system such as problems
with the power supply. The power
cable was actually laid from the
Kostner’s house. A few years earlier,
Erich Kostner’s father Franz
had constructed a small power
plant in order to provide Corvara
and the surrounding areas with
electricity. At first only a small
portion of the power generated
was intended for the chairlift.
The result, as Erich Kostner
likes to tell, was that there was
not enough power to operate the
lift with a full load. To solve the
problem they simply diverted
power from the households in
Kolfuschg, a neighbouring village,
because it took them some
time to get to Corvara and by
then the shortage was over.
Be that as it may, the chairlift
built in 1947 remains a pioneering
accomplishment, and it was also
the first step in establishing the
Alta Badia ski area, which today
enjoys an international reputation
as one of the gems of Dolomiti
Superski – the unique ski
interconnect that also goes back
to the idea and work of Erich
Kostner in collaboration with the
late Gianni Marzola.
Shortly before its sixtieth anniversary,
the Col Alt chairlift, which
was modernized in 1956, 1978 and
1990, is being replaced with a new
LEITNER 8-passengers gondola,
and work is now moving quickly
ahead. The new installation will
have a system capacity of 2400
persons per hour and will offer a
modern standard of comfort and
safety. This is the last achievement
to date of the untiring Erich
Kostner, who can still be found at
the construction sites in Corvara
and Col Alt – where everything
began sixty years ago and where
Erich Kostner is still writing ropeway
history today.