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Norway kicks off world’s largest indoor ski centre

The world's largest indoor ski centre is to be built just ten minutes drive from Norway's capital Oslo after the project got given the go ahead.

Norway kicks off world's largest indoor ski centre
The ski slope will have a capacity of 5,000 skiers an hour. Photo: Selvaag Gruppen

“This is more than a ski centre. We are going to build a hotel, apartments, a winter academy, and shops. It will be a destination,” Kjetil Fladmark-Larsen, chief executive of Lorensburg Winter Park, told Norway's TV2 broadcaster, as the parent company, Selvaag Group, gave the project the green light.    

“On 9 September 2015,  the green light was given to start construction of Skihallen,” Selvaag said on its website Skilhallen.no. “After four years of superior engineering and planning we will work together with the architects firm Snøhetta to produce details plans and drawings.” 

The six-story building will contain 36,000 square meters of snow, and a slope 505 meters long and more than 100 meters wide. The slope will have five different ski lifts, three different runs and a capacity for 5,000 skiers an hour.

The centre will also house an indoor cross-country ski track, where 1,000 people will be able to ski at once.
 
Construction will start before the end of this year. 
 
 “We're moving the snow to town – all year round,” Fladmark-Larsen told TV2. “We will build cross-country skiing on the third floor, and a big jump and downhill slope. Children and young people will be able to combine skiing and school. This is the future training centre for winter sports athletes.”
 
Snowworld, near the city of Aachen in The Netherlands, currently claims to be the world's largest indoor ski slope, with 35,000 square metres of snow. 
 
Dubai holds the record for the longest indoor run, with the Mall of the Emirates boasting a 400 metre slope, although the city plans to eclipse its own record, building a 1.2km slope by 2020.  
 
Selvaag Group, founded by Olav Selvaag in 1936 built tens of thousands of homes in Oslo in the 1950s and 1960s pioneering mass producing homes using lightweight timber frames. 
 
 
 
 
 

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SKIING

Snow report: What’s the latest outlook for French ski resorts this winter?

Good news for skiers in France, as a mild December has given way to a cold blast in early January that's bringing some much-needed snow.

Snow report: What's the latest outlook for French ski resorts this winter?

After a mostly dry and mild December, snow returned to the the Pyrenees on Friday.

Meanwhile most resorts in the Alps have been able to stay open after a promising early start to the ski season, thanks to fresh snowfalls, with more on the way this weekend.

Pyrenees

Snow has returned in the Pyrenees. Some 5cm fell overnight into Friday, January 5th in eastern parts of the mountain range, with forecasts predicting a further 15cm to 20cm to be on the ground 24 hours later. The region had not seen any snow since December 2nd.

In Angles, 20cm of snow had fallen at higher altitudes by mid-morning on Friday.

Further west, numerous resorts in the Pyrénées-Atlantiques département remained closed this week after early December snow had melted in mild conditions that have dominated France in recent weeks, but significant snowfall is expected over the weekend into Monday, and resorts are hoping that they will see enough to open.

One resort, Artouste, has been unable to offer skiing since the start of the season on December 23rd due to a lack of snow. A scenic rail service – usually reserved for warmer months – has kept the resort going. It is set to stop running on Friday, amid expectations of enough snow to finally open the slopes.

READ ALSO Climate crisis: ’90 percent’ of Europe’s ski resorts face critical snow shortages

Alps 

Many ski resorts opened on time, or even a little earlier than scheduled last month, after significant early snow fall, and have enjoyed deposits in the first days of 2024. But, even here, resort managers welcomed the promise of more significant snow this weekend.

Some resorts weren’t so fortunate. Ski areas in Gérardmer, in the Vosges, were still closed in the week leading up to Christmas because of poor snow conditions, but they are hoping for enough snow to finally get started this weekend, while La Bresse-Honeck was using ‘stocked snow’ made by using snow that fell earlier in the winter months to stay open as recently as December 30th.

In the Northern Alps, resorts such as Alpe d’Huez benefited from fresh snowfall on December 22nd, while Val d’Isère had new snow on December 29th. In the Southern Alps, Les Orres’ last pre-New Year snow was on December 8th.

And the French Alps have enjoyed more snow since the start of the year. There’s at least 50cm of fresh snow on the higher slopes of Les Gets and Morzine, for example, a significant improvement on the same time last year, when the resorts were among several that had very little snow to speak of.

In Chamonix, meanwhile, snow has fallen on eight of the last 14 days, with more expected every day between Friday and Monday.

Massif Central

As the post on X / Twitter shows, the Massif Central has not had the best of winters for snow so far. But between 30cm and 50cm is expected in Le Lioran by Monday. 

READ ALSO ‘So many barriers since Brexit’: The French ski businesses no longer willing to hire Brits

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