GstaadLife

Marcel Bach, Gstaad's self-made real-estate mogul, is running for a position on the Gemeinde's executive board. Local residents and guests hardly need reminding of Bach's crucial role in salvaging the Glacier, building the Alpina, and so on. If his candidacy is successful, it would be political confirmation of his numerous business achievements in the region. Based on his track record and close connections to everyone and everything that makes the region tick, his designs for office should be a done deal. Bach's background at once gives him appeal and at the same time ignites vitriol from across Gstaad's social spectrum. But whatever your perspective, there is no doubt that the combination of his local heritage and his links into Gstaad's barons and players makes an excellent platform for public office.

What's your take...

Well, we're back and we hope you had a good Easter break. Thanks for your patience over the past couple of weeks as we made some changes to prepare for new features that will appear on this website over the coming months. So what was up in Gstaad while we were away? Not that much actually...winter has returned, Marcel Bach is running for political office, and Andreas Hurni will be Gstaad Tourism's next president from January 1 2009 when he reaches the end of his term as Gemeinde President. The Geneva Motor Show came and went, and Hansueli Brand is busy fielding calls from Gstaaders pondering the implications of their next Range Rover being built by an Indian company. Oh, and the Big Dig has begun for summer 2008, with giant trenches opening up in the streets between Saanen and Gstaad for the Fernwärme alternative energy project, and the Palacestrasse gearing up for what promises to be a couple dozen earth removal trucks per hour as the Alpina construction gets under way. Apart from that, it's been pretty quiet. We'll get back in the groove of bringing you the latest from Saanenland over the next few days, including catching up with some photos and perspective from Aiglon College's recent event at the Palace and Depy Chandris' inimitable chalet party. As ever we're here on editor@gstaadlife.com if there's something you'd like us to write about...

We're going to be making some changes to the plumbing of this website over the next few days as part of our continued effort to bring you richer features to enjoy the local scene here in Gstaad-Saanenland. Posting will therefore be light until Easter. In the meantime, catch up on anything you might have missed so far this year...

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Last December, a petition was launched to lay out the case against the proposed Saanenmöser hospital project. The petition ended up amassing some 12,064 signatures (including several hundred from Saanenland), and was presented to the Bernese cantonal government on January 28 (photo above, see also Petition against Saanenmöser hospital submitted). The petition, however, has not resulted in the desired outcome. Writing to the Pro-Hospital-Zweisimmen committee in response to the petition, the cantonal representative maintained that he will not seek to influence investment decisions concerning regional hospital centers since the board of governors of STS (the company that operates our two local hospitals) has exclusive authority over the location of and investment in its hospitals.

We're guessing someone thought it would be pretty funny to manipulate a survey on GstaadLife.com. Because that's exactly what some joker did, distorting the poll we were conducting on whether the Rellerli should be closed for winter operations. Recently the Bergbahnen Destination Gstaad (BDG), the operating company for most of the region's cable cars, announced plans to realign Saanenland's skilift infrastructure (see Major changes proposed for Gstaad-area cable cars and related comments). The strongly-favored version of these plans (indeed the only one BDG said was workable) called for the removal of all skilifts on the Rellerli. It proved to be one of our most popular surveys ever, with 89% of the more than 200 voters clearly in favor of keeping the Rellerli going despite its struggles for snow the past two seasons. What's odd about someone taking the time to click on the "Yes, Rellerli winter operations should be scrapped" button (more than 150 times) is that it came in the immediate wake of a concerted email campaign from a number of GstaadLife readers, who wrote to Armon Cantieni, Director of BDG, urging him to reconsider the plan that clearly stated next winter would be Rellerli's last. In his responses Cantieni claimed that nothing has been decided finally as yet, and that all GstaadLife reader appeals to save Rellerli would be duly considered. It's just sad that someone with too much time on their hands had to try and fool everyone into thinking that the idea of keeping Rellerli open has no support. It does. To repeat, 89% of GstaadLife.com readers who voted in our survey want to keep Rellerli open in the winter, and no amount of survey manipulation is going to hide that fact.