Will mountain biking eventually overtake hiking in popularity throughout Europe’s Alpine Regions?

In some areas of the Alps there is an increasingly uneasy coexistence between mountain bikers and walkers, the former seemingly gaining greater traction with tourist associations. Are bikers, not hikers, now seen as greater financial contributors to alpine economies, but at what cost to the environment?

The status of equality afforded to mountain biking in many parts of the Alps is increasingly placing it on a par with the more traditional but less environmentally damaging pursuit of hiking.

I have spent three weeks in Saalbach, where during warmer months the bike reigns supreme in the Glemm Valley. Where once a leisurely river path between Saalbach and Hinterglemm would sooth aching limbs after a typically undulating traverse amongst the valley’s highest peaks, it is now an exercise in looking over ones shoulder in readiness for a speeding, helmeted menace that have led to some hikers being severely injured from collisions with often inconsiderate cyclists. Although there are dedicated mountain-bike trails – I hesitate to misleadingly call them the more sedate-sounding cycle paths – which seek to keep bikers apart from hikers, there have been many instances of this so-called mountainside etiquette being flouted. Should a hiker inexplicably stray onto an allocated bike track serious injury is a possibility, as is a mouthful of Anglo-Saxon invective.

I will never again visit Salzburgerland’s Saalbach Hinterglemm, predominantly for these reasons. Catering for tourists with a wide array of activities is entirely appropriate but genuflecting before the perceived cool and hip mountain-biker crowd is not, especially at the expense of hikers whose behaviour towards others and the environment is invariably far more respectful.

It isn’t though just the Glemmtal allowing the mountain-bike community to gain traction. Throughout the Tirol bikers are gouging their way through mountainsides often already stripped of the arboriculture that is so visually and physically vital; trees frequently act as a natural barrier to protect valley settlements from the devastating effects of avalanches. Whilst many bike trails are accommodated in established forests, soil erosion commensurate with such a pursuit redolent of environmental wear and tear can never be classed as alpine-friendly.

Austria seemingly continues to sacrifice many of its alpine regions on the altar of progress, an appellation usually used to justify the next cableway or ski run, but often at the expense of the treeline. The summer season not only lays bare what winter’s white coat flatters to deceive but also adds as insult to injury a profusion of pockmarked bike trails that state loudly that the Euro(€), anyone’s Euro, is Croesus’s heir apparent.

I therefore ask myself what is worse: mountain paths that act as shared space or dedicated bike tracks? One gets invaded by those for which it was never intended; the impact of the other goes far beyond the commensurate visual impact. It will be interesting to see during my forthcoming journey to the Arlberg whether the mountain-biking phenomenon varies resort to resort, or if a region-wide policy to embrace this divisive pastime has leapt from tacit tolerance to now being accepted on a par with hiking and climbing.

In the anything goes society in which we now reside it has become almost impossible to say no to the blandishments and whims of any individual or group, at the risk of being labelled a bigot, hater, or out of touch. There can though be no coincidence that standards of decency, restraint, and respect towards one’s self and others have reached an all time low. The erstwhile serenity of the symbiosis between man and mountain is in danger of being lost forever, all for the sake of chasing a fast buck. Not only is that a depressing statement to make, the inevitability that a landscape and to whom it means so much should finally be infected by naked commercialism and indifference to others is the saddest part of all.