By Michele Filippucci
Abstract: An investigation into the social and environmental impacts of the 2026 Winter Olympic Games in Cortina d’Ampezzo. Starting from the sustainability promises contained in the Olympic Dossier, public documents related to Olympic infrastructure, and testimonies from Cortina’s residents, the research analyses three planned infrastructure projects in the Ampezzo valley: the bobsleigh track, the Olympic Village, and a new cable car. The investigation raises questions about who truly benefits from the Games: tourism, winter sports, or the residents of Cortina d’Ampezzo.
From the terrace of a café in Cortina d’Ampezzo, a town of just over five thousand inhabitants nestled in a wide basin and surrounded by some of the most striking mountains of the Dolomites, we gaze at the landscape of the Tofane slope. Silverio, an activist from Ampezzo, with his finger pointing and a hand shielding his forehead from the sun, shows us the cable cars, calling them by name, explaining how the slopes—“the narrow passages, the tight turns among the trees” where he used to have fun as a boy—have changed over time, occupying increasingly larger portions of the mountainside. He points out the growing number of snow cannons for artificial snowmaking, the modernization of the chairlifts, the new gondola lift that since 2021, the year of the World Ski Championships, takes tourists—skis on their feet—all the way to the 5 Torri ski area. From there, the gondola cables disappear from view, reaching all the way to the Sellaronda circuit, over 40 kilometers away as the crow flies.
Further down, on the outskirts of Cortina d’Ampezzo, we see the construction site of the new bobsleigh track, the “Cortina Sliding Centre.” It is one of the infrastructures planned for the 2026 Milan-Cortina Winter Olympics, the next major distributed sporting event that will be hosted partly in the basin, as well as in Lombardy, Trentino, and South Tyrol. Silverio, together with the Open Olympics network he is part of—a group made up of more than twenty national-level associations and individual citizens—works to monitor the progress of preparations for the Olympic Games. The monitoring consists of gathering information online about infrastructure projects, available through public administration transparency platforms, and verifying the consistency between the plans, regulations, and the ongoing works. It is precisely thanks to this data that we learn that the bobsleigh track is not a construction site like the others: in order to complete the track in time for the Olympic event, a record will need to be set—685 days to finish the rough structure, and fewer than 400 days for the first mandatory test run with athletes on the track. No similar facility has ever been completed in less than 880 days.
The bobsleigh track is perhaps the most well-known example and the one that has attracted the most media attention regarding the delays and dysfunctions of the Italian organizational machinery for the 2026 Olympics. However, it is only one aspect of the broader story of the Ampezzo basin’s preparation to host the 2026 Olympic Games.
To better understand the situation, it is first necessary to describe the context in which the Olympic event will take place: Cortina d’Ampezzo is facing a trend of depopulation that began in the 1970s and has never stopped. According to registry data (1), the town’s population has decreased from 8,600 inhabitants in 1973 to 5,600 in 2024. Despite the small number of residents, the town offers more than 20,000 beds (2) between hotels and related services—figures that indicate a strong condition of over-tourism. According to the Ski Report by Savills Research (3), housing prices are steadily rising and have reached an average of €12,200 per square meter—the highest of any ski resort in Italy.
At the same time, in the Alps, global warming is causing a temperature increase nearly twice the global average (IPCC, High Mountain Areas) (4), leading to more frequent extreme precipitation events and a decrease in snowfall. These changes have inevitable consequences for the practice of winter sports, which are shifting to higher altitudes and becoming increasingly dependent on artificial—or programmed—snowmaking. According to the Nevediversa report by Legambiente, this phenomenon results in the abandonment of lower-altitude ski lifts and a rise in the prices of higher-altitude resorts, favoring a luxury tourism model that is more evenly spread over time (consistent with the use of programmed snow) and thus geared toward those who can afford a ski holiday. Over the past year, ski pass prices in Italy have increased by between 3.7% and 5.2%, and the ski industry’s revenue has grown by 8.9% compared to the previous year, showing a strong recovery from the pandemic period (Skipass Panorama 2023–2024) (5)—a recovery that comes with increasing energy and social costs, as it is subsidized by public funds. For the five-year period 2024–2028, the Ministry of Tourism has allocated €230 million in non-repayable public funding for the maintenance of ski slopes in Italian resorts and for infrastructure related to programmed snowmaking. According to a recent investigation by IRPI Media (6), this is in addition to regional funding for snow tourism, which amounts to €41 million in the Veneto region alone.
During the bidding phase, the Italian National Olympic Committee (CONI) promised an Olympics that would make use of existing infrastructures, guided by sustainability and fully aligned with the economic and social development of the host territories. In this investigation, drawing on public data about Olympic works collected through the efforts of the Open Olympics network and numerous testimonies gathered in the field, we aim to answer the question: has the Cortina d’Ampezzo project lived up to the Olympic promises made during the bidding phase?
The involvement of the residents of Cortina d’Ampezzo and the “bobsled track” case
Roberta de Zanna, a town councillor of Cortina d’Ampezzo for the civic list Cortina Bene Comune since the 2021 elections, tells us how in 2018, during the Olympic bidding phase, she proposed—together with a large group of citizens—a consultative referendum for the Ampezzano municipality to involve the residents of the valley in the decision to host the Olympic event or not. Then-mayor Ghedina rejected the idea of a consultative referendum, justifying the decision by citing a generally confirmed consensus (estimated through an online survey) among shopkeepers, ski lift operators, the Municipality of Milan, and the general population. He argued that, regardless of the outcome, the decision to host the Olympics had already been made. The online survey Ghedina refers to was an initiative by CONI and the IOC, collecting around 2,500 responses—607 of which came from the Veneto region. The results show that 80% of the survey respondents were in favor of hosting the Olympic Games in the region. However, for those 607 responses, there is no information on the sampling method or on how many respondents were residents of Cortina d’Ampezzo or the surrounding alpine areas. This is a significant gap, especially in an area where the number of residents is small compared to the number of people who visit the town as tourists or own second homes there.
This marks the first denial of a space for public discussion around Olympic planning for the residents of the Ampezzo valley — an attitude that underpins the series of controversies surrounding the bobsled track.
In 2019, Italy was awarded the 2026 Winter Olympics, yet in Cortina d’Ampezzo, the event was scarcely mentioned in the years that followed. In 2021, the Milano Cortina Infrastructure Company (SIMICO) was established, and a series of ministerial decrees allocated the public funds needed for Olympic construction. According to the most recent Prime Ministerial Decree dated 08/09/2023, the total Olympic expenditure amounts to €3.4 billion. It was during this planning and funding phase that the proposal to restore the “Eugenio Monti” bobsled track — presented in the original bid as a renovation of the facility built for the 1956 Olympics — took the form of a full demolition and complete rebuild to meet the standards required for modern bobsleigh, skeleton, and luge competitions. As outlined in the 08/09/2023 decree, the allocated budget for the project totals €118 million — even more than the Cesana Pariol track, which was built for the 2006 Turin Olympics at a cost of around €110 million. Labeling the new bobsled project, the Cortina Sliding Centre, as a “redevelopment” exempts it from undergoing an Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA) — a procedure typically required for large-scale public or private infrastructure projects. The EIA evaluates the potential impact of a development on water, soil, fauna, flora, human health, the landscape, and cultural heritage, and it includes a public consultation process. This exemption from the EIA, combined with concerns over the long-term viability of the facility — which is expected to cost €1.5 million per year in maintenance and operational expenses, the same costs that led to the closure of the Cesana Pariol track after just five years — has sparked renewed protests from civil society.
A significant number of Ampezzo residents, along with more than fifty associations and activists from across Italy, protested on 24 September 2023 and again on 19 February 2024 to oppose the construction of the new bobsleigh track and to urge institutions to host the bobsleigh, skeleton, and luge events in Innsbruck, using an already operational facility. In addition, the Belluno chapter of Italia Nostra, under the leadership of Giovanna Ceiner, filed a legal complaint with the Regional Administrative Court (TAR), citing violations of the public procurement code, the cultural heritage code, and the environmental code. However, after repeated delays, the legal challenge became too costly and was dropped due to a lack of funds. Following two failed public tenders—both voided due to a tense political climate and major delays—Minister of Infrastructure and Transport Matteo Salvini stepped in, proposing a “light project”, one that could be completed more quickly and that would allegedly avoid the felling of several centuries-old larches. The construction firm Pizzarotti submitted a bid in the third tender, won uncontested, and was awarded the contract to build the track in record time, with the “laying of the first stone” taking place on 19 February 2024.
Pietro Gaspari, one of the moderators of Pista da Boh—an Instagram page run by young Ampezzo locals that, during the protests against the bobsleigh track, raised awareness about the contradictions of the project—explains how this substantial public investment appears nonsensical given the current state of the area. His peers are being forced to leave the valley: despite soaring housing costs, the area offers few services in return. Those 118 million euros, he argues, could have been invested in public services or cultural initiatives. In Cortina d’Ampezzo, both the local cinema and public swimming pool have been closed. The municipality had promised to reopen them in time for the 2021 World Ski Championships, but never delivered. The only hospital nearby, the Codivilla Clinic, has seen its services cut due to a renovation that has dragged on for years and is now expected to be completed just in time for the Olympics. For many specialist medical appointments, residents must travel over an hour to Belluno or Brunico. Public transport is mostly designed with tourists in mind, connecting the valley to major cities in the lowlands but poorly serving the Boite Valley and routes between Cadore and Ampezzo. Additionally, the former bus station, once located next to the train station, was demolished to make way for a commercial area as part of a public-private partnership project for the redevelopment of the site. A new bus station is supposed to be built as part of the new “intermodal mobility” plan outlined in the DPCM of 08/09/2023. This is an ambitious initiative that could address some of Cortina d’Ampezzo’s transport issues, potentially providing a valuable legacy—a term often used in this context to describe the lasting benefits of the Olympic Games. While the intent has been welcomed by the local population, the reality so far has revealed deep contradictions.
The Apollonio–Socrepes Gondola Lift and a New Mobility Plan for Cortina d’Ampezzo
The “Public-Private Partnership Proposal for a New Integrated Intermodal Mobility System in the Municipality of Cortina d’Ampezzo,” outlined in the DPCM of 08/09/2023, includes three major interventions in the Ampezzo area: a new gondola lift connecting the Apollonio area—on the outskirts of Cortina d’Ampezzo—with the Socrepes ski area; an underground, cone-shaped parking structure with five levels and over 700 parking spots; and an underground system of moving walkways and escalators (referred to as the “Moving Walkway”), designed to allow skiers to reach the opposite side of the resort, toward the Faloria ski lifts, directly from the parking facility. The project is expected to cost approximately 127 million euros: 25 million from the state, around 7 million from the Veneto region, and the remaining 95 million from private investors. These private stakeholders would profit from the commercial spaces integrated into the parking structure (including dining facilities and a fitness area), as well as from the sale of the parking spots themselves. Above the underground car park, a new bus and ski shuttle station is planned, intended to replace the now-demolished intermodal transport hub near the train station. While the expensive proposal aims to reduce car traffic in the town center by decentralizing vehicle access, it has been subjected to an environmental impact assessment, which has caused significant delays. With less than a year to go before the start of the Olympics, construction has yet to begin on the gondola lift—despite it being a key element of the plan, intended to transport spectators to the Olympia slope, where the women’s alpine skiing events will take place.
The delay in the EIA approval process is primarily due to two factors: the opinion of the Superintendence for Archaeology, Fine Arts and Landscape, responsible for evaluating the impact of the project on the landscape of the Mortisa meadows—one of the last remaining pastures overlooking the town, which would be crossed by the gondola lift pylons—and the presence of a landslide affecting much of the Tofane mountainside facing Cortina d’Ampezzo. This landslide, known as the “Mortisa landslide,” has been reviewed by the Eastern Alps River Basin Authority.
Giulia Bossi, author of a study conducted by the National Research Council (CNR) on the Mortisa landslide, explains that this slow-moving landslide shifts at the surface at a rate of several centimetres per year, depending on the area, while deeper layers can reach speeds of up to two metres per year. As noted by the Eastern Alps River Basin Authority, over the long term, this movement could displace the gondola lift pylons, requiring regular and costly maintenance work.
The measurements in Dr. Bossi’s study are based on observations carried out prior to 2012. Meanwhile, Chiara Siorpaes, a geologist with a PhD and a freelance professional active in the Ampezzo area, explains that the rise in temperatures due to climate change could impact the dynamics of the landslide, which may become increasingly significant in the future: “Rising temperatures could, during the winter months, reduce the number of days when the surface layer in landslide-prone areas freezes, leading to increased water infiltration and, as a result, greater annual displacement.” These changes have already been confirmed by two interviewed sources who wish to remain anonymous, even though no public technical studies have yet documented them. It is therefore reasonable to assume that more frequent landslide movements will lead to more frequent extraordinary maintenance work, both on existing chairlifts and on the new gondola lift.
Moreover, during the review of the documentation for the EIA, the Eastern Alps River Basin Authority conducted new simulations of hydrogeological risk in the area where the Boite River meets the Rio Bigontina. These simulations revealed flooding events with a recurrence interval of approximately once every thirty years. As these results must be incorporated into the Flood Risk Management Plan (PGRA), large portions of the Apollonio area would be deemed unsuitable for the construction of underground structures, fundamentally altering the plans for both the parking facility and the Moving Walkway.
Despite the identified critical issues, on 6 February 2025 the Eastern Alps River Basin Authority approved the cable car project with five requirements. Likewise, the Superintendence for Archaeology, Fine Arts and Landscape gave a favourable opinion, although describing the cable car as a “compromise to a rural landscape of exceptional value,” and issued seven requirements. Luca Zaia, President of the Veneto Region, following months of tension between SIMICO, the Municipality of Cortina d’Ampezzo, and the Region due to accumulated delays, welcomed the decision, stating he was “pleased with the positive outcome delivered by the technical experts of the River Basin Authority and the Superintendence, who acted in full independence and expressed their recommendations.” At the time of writing, the project has been divided into three phases, of which only the first — the construction of the Apollonio-Socrepes cable car — could be completed before the start of the Olympic Games. The accumulated delays and ongoing issues have also led one of the private partners, Quick No Problem Parking, to voice serious concerns about the financial viability of the project.
Ampezzo’s civil society is divided on the issue: some residents and tourists we spoke with during our field research believe that the construction of the underground parking facility is necessary to move winter car traffic to the outskirts of the town. However, if the underground parking structure proves incompatible with the Flood Risk Management Plan (PGRA), this part of the project could be excluded or heavily revised. This would risk leaving Cortina d’Ampezzo without a proper bus terminal, with no improvements to the current parking situation, and with a cable car system requiring expensive maintenance (entirely funded with public money). This scenario has become even more likely after one of the private partners in the project stepped back, raising doubts about the feasibility of the Moving Walkway.
Other members of civil society strongly oppose the implementation of the intermodal mobility plan. Among the opponents—seven public comments were submitted by local associations and individual citizens during the Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA) consultation phase—stands out the name of engineer Gillarduzzi. In a public letter dated March 20, 2025, he draws on his background as a geologist with 26 years of experience in engineering and as an active member of the Ampezzo community to argue that the project is likely economically unsustainable. He points to the constant maintenance it would require, the expropriation procedures involved, and future management costs. In his view, the plan offers no real service to local residents, especially if the parking facility is not built. Much like the bobsled track, Cortina d’Ampezzo’s new mobility plan risks being another large-scale public expenditure that fails to benefit its citizens. A dynamic that seems to recur with several Olympic infrastructures, including the Olympic Village in Fiames, which is set to be dismantled after the Games, leaving no legacy for the local population.
The Olympic Village and the Housing Issue in Cortina d’Ampezzo and the Cadore Area
During the Olympic Games, most athletes and technical staff will be accommodated in the Olympic Village—a temporary structure located in Fiames, a few kilometers upstream from Cortina d’Ampezzo along the Boite Valley. The village will consist of prefabricated wooden houses built on stilts and will occupy the former Cortina airport site. The selected area is an alluvial plain adjacent to the Boite stream, and according to the Flood Risk Management Plan (PGRA), its perimeter includes areas classified as having moderate hydraulic and geological risk. Due to its temporary nature, the Olympic Village was exempted from undergoing an Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA), thus relieving SIMICO of the obligation to carry out further investigations into hydrogeological risk or to engage in public dialogue with the River Basin Authority. While this exemption may appear harmless given that the structure will be in use during the winter—a period rarely affected by flooding—the infrastructure remains exposed to risk during the assembly and dismantling phases, scheduled for spring/summer 2025 and spring 2026 respectively. During the winter of 2025, Stefano Pirro, president of the Cortina Hoteliers Association, formally proposed repurposing the Olympic Village as housing for seasonal workers after the Games. Although the proposal was initially met with interest by both the local administration and SIMICO, it was later blocked by Cortina’s mayor Gianluca Lorenzi and the political opposition. Their concerns focused on the creation of a residential area disconnected from the town’s core and lacking permanent services, as well as on the potential violation of the justification for bypassing the EIA process.
During the planning phase of the Olympic village in Fiames, to assess the hydrogeological risk associated with the alluvial plain, the Flood Risk Management Plan (PGRA) in force from 2015 to 2021 was used, which does not take into account the flood events of the past 10 years. As part of this research, an analysis of the Boite stream’s flow upstream of the town of Cortina d’Ampezzo was carried out using public data from ARPAV (Veneto Regional Agency for Environmental Protection). Our analysis shows that during storm Vaia in 2018, the Boite recorded its highest flow rate since 1992. Storm Vaia was an extreme weather event that, between October and November, devastated large areas of northern Italy with winds exceeding 190 km/h and torrential rainfall, felling millions of trees. A scientific study (9) conducted by the Universities of Innsbruck and Trento demonstrated that the storm was made more likely and more intense by global warming, suggesting that such phenomena could become increasingly frequent. These intense weather events affect not only the flow rate of the Boite and thus the flood risk of the Fiames plain: extreme rainfall also interacts with mountain streams, generating flows with sediment and landslides, known as debris flows (10). According to the Flood Risk Management Plan (PGRA) maps, the Fiames area is indeed subject to debris flows and is therefore exposed to a geological risk that could increase in the coming decades.
By comparing the 2015–2021 Flood Risk Management Plan PGRA with the updated document for the 2021–2027 period, we also found that the maps in the plan have not been updated. PGRA maps are revised based on studies conducted in the area, and to produce accurate and detailed maps, it is necessary to carry out thorough territorial monitoring and implement specific studies and modelling. Perhaps the Olympics could have been an opportunity to launch new research on hydrogeological risks in the Ampezzo basin and design infrastructure aimed at making the territory resilient to climate change. This could have represented a legacy proposed by local authorities and agreed upon with the competent bodies ahead of the Olympic event. Instead, what we have seen is that, on several occasions, environmental impact assessments were avoided in the name of urgency.
Roberta de Zanna, a member of the Cortina d’Ampezzo opposition council, described the Olympic Village as “a missed opportunity.” Its construction will cost around 39 million euros in public funds, used to host 1,400 people for a total of 28 nights. Doing the math, that comes to €970 per guest per night. A significant expense that, while leaving no permanent mark on the landscape or environment, also offers no long-term benefit for the local community. De Zanna also told us about an early proposal to reuse the former Eni Village in Corte di Cadore, a residential complex of 280 small villas built on the slopes of Mount Antelao to host employees of the major energy company during holidays. The village was decommissioned in the 1990s, and today many of the houses have been bought by private individuals or other companies and are used as holiday homes. Investing in the Eni Village would have been a way to leave a legacy for the region and to redevelop an area where some buildings are increasingly falling into disrepair. One of the main reasons for abandoning the idea of repurposing the Eni Village was the high hydrogeological risk, as reported by Sports Minister Abodi in the Senate on 29 February 2024. A justification that is hard to fully understand, given that similar risks appear to affect many of the other sites chosen for Olympic infrastructure.
Sindi Manushi, the young mayor of Pieve di Cadore and councillor for the province of Belluno, shared with us some reflections on the housing issue in Cadore that also resonate with the Ampezzo area. In a region like Pieve, where identifying new buildable land is difficult due to both landscape protection and hydrogeological risk management, it is essential to enhance existing buildings. While it’s true that houses are privately owned, it’s also true that how they are used is a matter of public interest. A home used as a second residence or left in a state of neglect reduces the territory’s ability to attract young families or workers, thus contributing to the depopulation of mountain areas. Rather than constructing a temporary village, investment could have been directed toward unused housing, with the aim of distributing Olympic staff and athletes more widely across the area. However, as Minister Abodi also explained in the Senate, this model is not compatible with IOC regulations for Olympic accommodations.
The Broken Promises of the Bid Dossier
The work carried out so far in preparation for the Milan-Cortina 2026 Olympics has not lived up to the promises made during the bidding phase. The estimated spending for the Cortina d’Ampezzo area alone has reached €900 million in public and private funding (the three projects analysed here are only part of the planned Olympic infrastructure), breaking the promise of Olympic Games that would rely solely on existing infrastructure.
As engineer Pellegrini, a senior official for the Veneto Region, explained during a meeting with environmental associations in Cortina d’Ampezzo held on 11 April 2022, the Olympics have become an opportunity to unlock public and private funding in the region. Instead of building for the Olympics, infrastructure was built thanks to the Olympics. These investments—initially presented during the bidding phase as “fully aligned with the long-term development plans of the host cities and regions”—in the case of the Ampezzo area were carried out in a context of intense debate and division, shaped in some cases by political alignment or environmental concerns, and in others by conflicting economic interests between tourism entrepreneurs and local residents.
One undeniable effect of the Olympics has been a boost to the real estate market, which led to the purchase and renovation of several long-abandoned hotels in the Ampezzo basin. Among them: Hotel d’Ampezzo, Cristallo, Venezia, and Italia. In all these cases, however, the properties were bought either by private individuals from outside the Ampezzo area or by international financial firms, such as the luxury hotel multinational Mandarin. This same real estate boost also drove up housing prices, turning Cortina d’Ampezzo into a profitable opportunity for wealthy external investors—while making it increasingly difficult for young locals to afford a first home.
At the same time, despite climate change representing a serious threat to the winter sports economy, the words adaptation and mitigation are nowhere to be found in the planning documents for Olympic infrastructure. On the contrary, in some cases, authorities have chosen to bypass Environmental Impact Assessments, avoid investing in studies for mitigating hydraulic and geological risks, and build infrastructure in questionably suitable areas. Moreover, investment continues to flow into winter sports which, according to Legambiente’s Nevediversa report, are increasingly geared towards luxury tourism due to the effects of climate change—further driving up housing prices.
During the winter of 2025, on the initiative of a group of Cortina d’Ampezzo residents and with the support of the online newspaper l’Altramontagna, a survey was conducted to gauge local sentiment toward the Olympic infrastructure. Among the 627 respondents living in the Ampezzo basin or in Cadore, 56% described the rise in rents and property values linked to the sporting event as “extremely negative.” While residents appreciated the roadworks planned for the Alemagna state highway in preparation for the Games, a majority expressed opposition to the construction of the bobsled track, the Olympic village, and the Socrepes cable car. Sixty-four percent believe the Olympics have a negative environmental impact. Faced with these results—which starkly contrast with the survey promoted by the IOC and CONI during the candidacy phase—it’s only natural to ask: who exactly are the investments in Cortina d’Ampezzo, referenced by engineer Pellegrini in 2022, meant to benefit? To quote engineer Gillarduzzi in his open letter to the Ampezzo community: “SIMICO certainly cares about the Olympics, but who is looking out for Cortina and the people who live here?”
Sources:
(1) Lorenzi R. ed S., “Cortina 2020-2040. Storia di una comunità al tramonto?” (2022, Light Hunter Publications), p.14.
(2) Osservatorio Valori Immobiliari delle Strutture Ricettive, “Report Hotel 2019 Focus Montagna” (2019, World Capital).
(3) Savills Research, “The Ski Report World Residential – Winter 2021, 2022” (2022, Savills Research), p. 15
(4) Hock, R., G. Rasul, C. Adler, B. Cáceres, S. Gruber, Y. Hirabayashi, M. Jackson, A. Kääb, S. Kang, S. Kutuzov, Al. Milner, U. Molau, S. Morin, B. Orlove, and H. Steltzer, “2019: High Mountain Areas. In: IPCC Special Report on the Ocean and Cryosphere in a Changing Climate”. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, UK and New York, NY, USA, pp. 131–202. https://doi.org/10.1017/9781009157964.004.
(5) Osservatorio Italiano del Turismo Montano, “Skipass Panorama Turismo” (2024, Skipass), p. 6
(6) M. Bertelli, F. Bonalumi, A. Tranquillo, “I Padroni della Neve” (2025, IRPI media).
(7) Bossi, G.; Mantovani, M.; Frigerio, S.; Schenato, L.; Marcato, G.; Pasuto, A.” A Monitoring Network to Map and Assess Landslide Activity in a Highly Anthropized Area”. (2016, Geosciences). https://doi.org/10.3390/geosciences6030040
(8) Dott. Gillarduzzi A., “Lettera Aperta, Osservazioni sulla Nuova Cabinovia D’Apollonio/Socrepes” (19 marzo 2025, Voci di Cortina).
(9) Castiglione A., “From global warming to extreme precipitation: An attribution study of the Vaia storm (2018) to raise climate change risk-perception in the Trentino population” (2023, Università degli studi di Innsbruck, Università degli studi di Trento).
(10) Turkington, T., Remaître, A., Ettema, J. et al. Assessing debris flow activity in a changing climate. (2016, Climatic Change Springer Nature). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10584-016-1657-6
A heartfelt thank you to Sofia Farina for her invaluable contribution in collecting the interviews, and to Carlotta Bartolucci of the Open Olympics network for her constant support and shared commitment. Thanks also to all the network members active in the Ampezzo area for generously sharing materials, public documents, and contacts related to the Olympic infrastructure in Cortina. A special thank you, finally, to the activists and residents of Cortina d’Ampezzo, whose voices, stories, and reflections made this investigation possible.
Cover image: View of Cortina from the Tofane side in February 2025
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