The Bavarian municipality of Balderschwang has engaged with the Swiss municipality of Sattel to address similar challenges.
A delegation from Balderschwang and the cross-border Austrian municipalities of Hittisau, Riefensberg, and Sibratsgfäll recently visited the Swiss municipality of Sattel. This exchange is part of the European project “BeyondSnow,” in which Balderschwang is the German pilot municipality and Sattel is the Swiss one.
Led by the mayor of Balderschwang, Konrad Kienle, the delegation from Allgäu and neighboring Bregenzerwald municipalities gathered information on regional and local tourism at Mostelberg.
Year-round offerings engage the entire region
Representatives from Sattel-Hochstuckli AG, Schwyz Tourism, and Buuremärcht Sattel provided visitors with an overview of the history, offerings, and current challenges of tourism in the Sattel-Hochstuckli region.
During a joint workshop moderated by Katharina Gasteiger, director of Alliance in the Alps, and Peter Niederer, deputy director of the Swiss Working Group for Mountain Regions, many similarities and common challenges emerged, despite often very different starting points. While Balderschwang, with 375 inhabitants, has 1,231 beds and generates 19,000 overnight stays, Sattel is almost exclusively active in day tourism, influenced by weather conditions. However, topics such as “year-round offerings” and “winter offerings independent of snow” are of interest to both regions. The workshop focused on exchanging experiences and learning from each other.
The visit concluded with a trip to the Morgarten Information Center, which commemorates the famous battle, a founding moment of the Swiss Confederation. Pirmin Moser, from the Morgarten Foundation, explained how the history of Morgarten, a key element of Swiss cultural memory, has been leveraged for cultural tourism together with neighboring municipalities in the Ägerital valley.
