A mountain village with a vast vision: How a bold vision becomes reality

Authors: Philipp Bont & Severin Schindler
Photos:  Archiv GAB, Silvano Zeiter © Switzerland Tourism

#1 The future belongs to those who believe in the beauty of their dreams

In 2003, Romeo Volken and some of his biking colleagues set off for Canada, more precisely to Whistler. You might guess that they wanted to explore the bike park there. They came back highly inspired, with lots of new impressions and the key realization that Bellwald also needs a bike park. Despite initial skepticism in the village, with a small budget and a lot of volunteer work by the “Community of Alternative Mountain Cyclists” association, the first trail was built in the summer of 2005 and opened in 2006. Today the trails is called “Dirty Cranking” and has been used for over 15 years to host the iXS DH Cup.

The first seasons were marked by considerable success. Word of the popular downhill track quickly spread and attracted a large part of the then still small Swiss downhill scene to Bellwald. Although the track was quickly established as an important part of the summer program, new challenges soon emerged. Maintenance was difficult to manage with volunteer work. Since the further development of the bike park requires time-consuming planning and approval procedures, the further development of the bike park was temporarily blocked. This left room for other developments. A pump track was created in the village and the “Stoneman Glaciara” marathon route was launched.

In the background, however, the Vision 2024 was already being worked on energetically and with foresight from 2013. The goal was a family-friendly, playful but varied bike park. This should not only make it possible to get started in the sport, but also attract advanced and expert riders to Bellwald. Conceptually, the park was geared towards all-mountain and enduro bikes, as even then the majority of the gravity market was no longer riding downhill bikes. This significantly expanded the target group spectrum.

#2 The Forest Bump Trail ushers in a new era

In spring 2020, the time had come. After a long planning and approval phase of around seven years, approval was received for the bike park expansion with four new trails and two trails to be converted. The new main artery is a beginner-friendly trail. It is also trail number two in Vast’s company history.

It was clear to us that we were not going to create a conventional flow trail here, but rather a trail with flow. The flow trail construct quickly became the holy grail of mountain bike infrastructure in the tourism context. Apparently low-maintenance, safe, suitable for beginners and the masses and, what’s more, it made money. The mountain bike scene was also fascinated at the beginning by the fact that people can simply enjoy and roll along a trail. And all of this without using the brakes, without studying the ideal line and without having to push yourself to the limit. But that is exactly what made the flow trail soon frowned upon: too banal, too simple and too monotonous; boring “marble tracks” were disparagingly referred to. It became increasingly clear that a supposedly perfect trail is not perfect just because it is so perfect.

In this whole discourse, we noticed that with all these requirements, one central point was increasingly pushed into the background or in some places even forgotten completely: the fun of riding – not a nice to have, but the central criterion. Without ignoring other important requirements such as safety, sustainability or integration. Tables and steep berms with a lot of support can be mastered even as a beginner or should be learned as quickly as possible. For more difficult elements, there is also the option of a B-line or optional side hits. But doing justice to all these different aspects requires a high level of understanding of the sport and design and, of course, a concentrated load of construction expertise. At the opening in July 2021, it quickly became clear to us that our interpretation of the flow trail had hit the nerve of the times!

#3 The planning seeds are getting harvested

However, the Forest Bump Trail was just the beginning. Between 2021 and 2024, Vision 2024 gets implemented trail by trail. However, the bike park operation had to be discontinued again in 2022. The aging 2-seater chairlift was replaced by a modern 6-seater chairlift – higher transport capacity and greater reliability are the benefits. The following milestones can be recorded chronologically in the bike park development: 2020-21:

• 2020-21: Construction of Forest Bump, low threshold Flow Trail with room for individual improvment
• 2021: Re-construction of former blue line into Play Trail Sliderman, playful Line with jumps in the higher difficulty level
• 2021-22: Construction of natural single trail Into the Wild in medium difficulty level
• 2022-23: Construction of our signature Mix Trail Vast & Furious and at the same time opening of the top section of the bike park (2070 – 2560 a.s.l.)
• 2023-24: Construcion Enduro Trail Lord of the Rims; also in the top section
• 2024: Connector between Lord of the Rims and Vast & Furious
• 2024-25: Re-construction of existing Downhill Track Dirty Cranking

#4 Pillars of success become the basis of life

For the small mountain village of Bellwald with its 340 inhabitants, it is extremely important to be able to keep young people in the village and offer them a perspective. The bike park is already making a significant contribution to this by increasing the attractiveness of the community, creating a meeting place for locals and guests, making better use of the tourist businesses, generating more guests and jobs and thus providing the village with a solid livelihood, both socially and economically. This is demonstrated by the multimedia production of Schweiz Tourismus, which impressively portrays the Bike Park Bellwald and the local scene.

The infrastructure is one thing, the involvement of the community and the associated events is another. We firmly believe that a mountain bike destination can only function with a strong local community, because it maintains and carries the culture internally and externally. If the local population does not support the bike project, it will almost certainly never become a reality. Events such as the iXS DH Cup, the Rodeo Locals Tour and beginner-friendly trails are important entry points here. Because they bring the population closer to the sport of mountain biking. It is particularly important for decision-makers to practice and understand the sport themselves in order to be able to make sensible decisions. In addition to building trails, their operation and maintenance is just as important. From 2021, we began to involve locals in the construction (1 seasonal position) and were thus able to continuously build up the bike park maintenance crew. The transfer of know-how flowed into local hands over several years. Currently, 2-3 locals take care of the seasonal reshapes and ongoing maintenance.

These investments are clearly noticeable in the guest statistics. The increase in guest numbers between 2020 (last year before the new era) and 2023 (expansion to 4 new trails) was 917%, and the frequency of use increased by 842%. In 2023, the just over four months of operation resulted in a total of around 66,000 lift rides by mountain bikers alone. In addition to the mountain railways, the bike school, bike rental, bike shop as well as restaurants and accommodations also benefit directly from the bike park.

#5 A look into the future…

Independent of the bike park, the municipality of Bellwald is also planning another project of the century: a direct connection by cable car from the Fiesch public transport hub to Bellwald. This will not only make travelling by public transport faster and easier (from Bern to the bike park in 2 hours), but will also bring the two destinations, Aletsch Arena and Bellwald, closer together. This interaction between the two destinations is already noticeable today on the occasion of the 2024 Enduro World Cup and the 2025 Enduro World Championship, which they will host together. In addition to the railway connection, the trail development from Bellwald to Fiesch is also already being planned. The bike park will thus be expanded to include a third section. These developments will enable the potential to become a bike destination with international appeal.

What was hardly imaginable at the beginning has now almost been achieved by a small destination like Bellwald. The ambitious Vision 2024 is entering the home stretch. This story began and ends with a quote from Eleanor Roosevelt (US human rights activist and diplomat) – “The future belongs to those who believe in the beauty of their dreams”. In Bellwald, the dreams of the initiators and those involved in the project became reality because they believed in them and worked on them with tenacity. But that does not mean that we can’t keep dreaming. The first ideas for Vision 2034 have already been outlined… stay tuned!