So they closed Spain's Madrid biggest bikepark( la pinilla ) and didn't give any reason just 0 contact workers not getting paid local shops left without explaition and skiers and bikers without explanations so help us by filling a petition to get answers and have our bike park back This is the link help us by sharing it around
by awitaman
3 Comments
Is it privately owned?
https://lapinilla.es/comunicado-institucional/
This is from the official website. Seems like lack of snow made winter operations unviable. And that some bureaucratic BS may have blocked summer operations.
But I wouldn’t say this is without explanation, when there is an official comunique on their main website.
It is sad, and will happen more. Low/bad snow will shut ski stations. And converting them to bike operations will not always be easy or viable.
Good luck, hope they can re-open.
There are a lot of ski hills here in the US that are on shaky ground right now because of the snowfall we didn’t get this last season. Vail is the largest in the US and is feeling it bad this year and Boyne Resorts (the next largest owner of ski mountains in the US) is also in a bad spot right now. If they have another ski season like that they both may be on the ropes. First and foremost they are ski slopes, they make way more money in the winter from ski tourism than they do from MTB. The easy answer from those of us outside the industry is that they should just pivot to summer sports but it just isn’t as profitable no matter how you add it all up. Keeping the ski lifts in operation takes a lot of ongoing maintenance which is not cheap. The insurance they have to carry by law is also not cheap and it goes up every year. Then you have minimum staffing numbers and emergency trained personnel that have ongoing training and again are not cheap to keep on staff, but are also required to operate. This isn’t even accounting for trail maintenance and building that happens every year. If it isn’t profitable then the city itself can’t afford to keep it open and operate at a loss the same as a company can’t afford to do this indefinitely…bills gotta get paid. Its a bummer to lose your local hill but there is always the local trails that could use your love.