District Council on hiking accidents
“Perhaps there is more to the warning signs”
After the fatal accidents on the Alpstein, Bruno Huber, the governing captain of the responsible district, takes a position.
The Schwende-Rüte district of Appenzell-Inner Rhodes is responsible for the construction and maintenance of the hiking trails in the Alpstein area. Bruno Huber is the governing captain.
SonntagsBlick: Mr. Huber, what do the deaths in the Alpstein region do to you?
Bruno Huber: Basically, of course, a great concern. And one wonders what the causes are. These are currently being clarified by the public prosecutor’s office.
There are voices that assess the nature of your paths as dangerous.
As long as the cause of the accident is still unknown, it’s relatively easy to hack around in our paths. Of course they are demanding, they are also mountain hiking trails. People have to be aware of that. But the accidents happened in sections that are actually easy to walk on. That is why it is difficult for us that measures are now being demanded for particularly exposed areas that have nothing to do with the accidents. If the cause of the accident was within our area of responsibility, we would of course have taken immediate action
What do you think of installing more railings?
We’re definitely ruling out installing railings and safety nets on all the paths now. But what we will discuss at the next district council meeting are the possibilities for even better communication. We are already doing a lot in the area of warning signs, but there might be more to do. But there’s a catch, too.
Which would be?
The more signs you put up, the less you pay attention to them, as you can see from the prohibition signs. That’s why we’ll have to find a middle ground in order to hopefully be able to reduce the accident rate. However, we will not reduce them to zero. Accidents always happen in the mountains, just like in the water.