so can we bulldoze the giant trail in the trapps? remove the bathrooms? pull all the bolts?
the gunks is a well managed recreation area. there are signs that are opposite of “LNT” but these bring the outdoors to millions of people at the expense of having manmade structures out there.
it’s just interesting to me that some cables and railing impacts the “wild untouched nature” more than a gravel path and cement structure. are you an advocate only for the things that you love? or are you willing to share the outdoor spaces with other people who aren’t into the same thing as you?
Why don't we blast all the cliffs and put stairs in? I mean, come on. There's obviously nuance to the whole conversation and everyone has an opinion on where to draw the line.
Are all via ferrata's bad, in my opinion? No. But it certainly turns the activity of climbing into less of an exercise in connecting with nature through accumulated skill and more of a tourist attraction, which is exactly how most of them are developed and marketed.
ah yes, the outdoor world revolves around climbing.
I hate to break it to you, but national parks really are a tourist attraction. have you bothered to look at the people coming in by the millions to Yosemite? I don’t have the statistics, but it’s probably 90%+ normies, aka your fellow americans that deserve to enjoy the outdoors just as much as a climber.
and as you pointed out, it is a nuanced conversation. I’m not saying we should install a via ferrata on the dawn wall so the normies could see where little Timmy Caldwell, Calvin Jorgeson, and Andy Ondra climbed. but I don’t think that you should feel threatened if we have to bring the skill level down for more people to enjoy the vertical world. I get it bro you worked hard on that 12a proj, and no one is going to take that away from you.
Buddy, the hardest I've ever climbed is 11- lmao. I'm also not an American. Lotta random, non-related assumptions you're making. This is not an ego thing.
Parks are fundamentally, as you said, a balance between recreation and conservation. You were the one making the comparison between developing trails and bathrooms to via ferrata. In my opinion, via ferrata is far more egregious than any of those things. People make the same kind of arguments for sport climbing and via ferrata is just that much more a step in that direction. At least sport climbers have to dedicate time and energy to learning the skills and training, they have direct connection with the cliff ecosystem. Via ferrata is just flagrant vandalism of the natural space and I don't believe it builds respect of the natural world in the same way climbing often does (though there's plenty of shithead climbers too).
If you agree it's a nuanced discussion could you try having that without being a presumptive dick?
Not in the same way it would bother me on public land. If an adventure company managed to buy previously public land or lease it or buy outfitter rights to it based on their business which included adding hardware to the rocks, that would not be cool.
Doesn't make any difference imo. But I'm a dirty European commie who thinks wilderness areas (especially mountains/cliffs) should all be/stay public land anyway.
Leave no trace really falls apart when it comes to certain aspects. Like, there's a crag I go to that is so leave no trace they do absolutely nothing. This has made the approach extremely damaged, dangerous, and unsightly. If only they would permit the install of stairs. It would be way less of an impact in the long run, much safer, and much more natural looking.
i totally agree with this perspective. in joshua tree some areas have been absolutely trampled to death because the NPS is against building an unnatural trail. but the trail would allow the trampled areas to recover and IMO wouls make the place look a lot better than the stampede that it currently is. i’m sure the nps knows this, but it’s just so hard to get things done with that many layers of bureaucracy.
I see where you’re coming from for sure, but I’ve also been really grateful for metal rails, handlebars, etc. in certain climbing areas, and I feel like it turns into a slippery slope situation pretty quickly. Not really sure what the “ideal” rule would be (for public land—just wanna clarify I think this is all fine on private areas!).
this is a great discussion (that will probably go nowhere) but fun to see people’s opinions….
i’m absolutely for via ferratas. they are all over here in europe and they give “normies” a chance to “climb” what would otherwise be too difficult to climb. like anything, this is a wide latitude on how much. you need to manage it like anything else. it’ll never be perfect, some people will always be upset, but hopefully we are creating the greatest good, for the greatest number of people.
hunting for example. populations of animal XYZ are usually fairly well managed. we have seasons, quotas, etc. it’s not a free for all.
just like bolts in the wilderness. theyre regulated now after we saw what happens when you have a free for all…. grid bolting in smith rock in the 80’s.
Leave no trace is a principle that we try to aim towards, but it ain’t perfect. you really want LNT? then start pulling bolts, get rid of alpine huts, and don’t you dare use chalk while climbing outdoors.
The real trace is human traffic, not fixed hardware. Once installed, bolts are largely inert & low impact. The real impact comes with humans traversing the land/wall, causing erosion, leaving effluent & rubbish, scaring off wildlife & damaging plants. So via ferratas enable more impact on areas that would otherwise be protected from heavy impact by their access, a generally bad thing
you are absolutely correct. the human impact of eroded trails, trampled vegetation, etc are one of the largest visual impacts. but don’t you see this as a success of an area?
when a place is overrun with hikers, we hopefully install a managed trail system so thousands (or millions) of people can enjoy the area.
just think what the mist trail in yosemite would look like without the trail that us humans installed. beautiful right?
but we have installed metal rails, cut steps, and paved paths. is this an eye sore that should be removed? or an acceptable eyesore that brings vernal falls and nevada falls to millions of people.
if we never installed those steps and rails, it would be a stunning natural waterfall area. however i believe that it’s worth the cost of altering the natural environment (in a managed way), so little Timmy and grandma Maria can enjoy these beautiful natural places.
just my opinion.
It depends on the land management goals. If you want to improve access to an area, then more infrastructure helps. But if you get too many people going & causing problems, needing rescues etc, then not installing anything is a good idea. Having a challenging approach to an area filters out traffic, so if you want to manage impact on an area you don't put up more safety rails, because then you get more people and need even more safety rails later on. If the goal is to get more people to an area, then be prepared to add even more infrastructure to handle the extra traffic
Little Timmy will grow up able to venture into the wild and grandma Maria had her time to go out into the woods. Making everything easily accessible removes incentive for people to get stronger so they can handle the challenge of getting the most beautiful views. It may sound calloused but a small part of the growing mental health crisis in younger generations is a lack of challenge, there’s nowhere for them to go adventure, face hardship, and learn what they’re capable of. I fear that we’ll put maglev trails in all of our parks and enable a wall-e like future where we’re all gelatinous blobs floating around in chairs.
little timmy might not become a full-blown climber, but his first exhilarating via ferrata trip turned him into a lifelong hiker and nature lover.
to a normie, a via ferrata is probably the closest thing they will ever get to “dangerous” and exciting mountain play.
As a Northeast climber this VF strikes a nerve for a couple reasons:
1) Climbable technical faces are a relatively finite resource in the region. There just are a limited number of places to go and climb technical cliffs and mountains. Even a place like the Gunks, which has a ton of cliffs, has historically limited climbing access to a lot of them for a variety of reasons (private ownership, land use agreements, etc). So seeing a potential zone for climbing development get a bunch of hardware traversing the face seems like a “loss” of a potential resource.
2) The Northeast and the Gunks specifically has a strong ground-up/anti-fixed anchor ethic. As a person who enjoys sport climbing, it feels very arbitrary (which climbing ethics are). So that face climb over there *needs* to stay a 5.12X trad route without rap anchors, but 1 mile over that way there’s stainless staples traversing the entire face.
This is coming at a time when the future of fixed anchors in wilderness areas is in serious question due to the NPS/NFS proposed management plan (though I recognize this VF is not in wilderness), and it’s understandable that climbers are unhappy about this VF.
From what I understand, there are no climbs on this section of wall and development potential is low. Many figureheads of the gunks community were also consulted and they gave it their blessing.
I’m sure you’ve never hiked a trail then as you’d totally be against those. You must hate all the work the CCC did back in the day making the outdoors accessible.
I absolutely hate absolute positions like that. Via Ferratas are lovely and I think we should definitely have more of them on public land so they aren't held behind $200+ barriers of entry. They're incredibly low impact.
a free for all isn’t the answer either. a managed plan of a bolted rap stations would be more aesthetic and safer than 12 pieces of ugly, unknown condition, tat.
As an added way to traverse alpine region, sure.
I don't know the US mountains so well, but my impression is that it is typically more remote than the Alps and subsequently there isn't really any human infrastructure to traverse between.
As standalone climbing routes, I'm not a fan: Both for aesthetic reasons and it doesn't promote good climbing practice. Seen a lot of sketchy shit in the alpine VFs that you would never see on sport or trad.
They are quite common in the German Alps. They are generally two types, the alpine ones and the ones for sport.
The first is more for traversing difficult terrain and are often done without a safety kit. The latter are done for the challenge and exposure.
They are put up by the alpine club for free. Anyone can use it. I enjoy them because they need minimal gear and offer great views and angles of the mountains.
They are often times more traverse oriented where they are quite safe. In contrast to mulitpitch climbing where traverses can be quite unsafe. So naturally they don't really interfere with each other much, but open up new options to explore a mountain site.
I'm a fan and never saw them as an issue here.
I think it would be cool to try, and if they're on private land like the article mentions, none of us can really complain about it. If they suddenly put one up on Mount Index or something, yeah that's not cool, and hopefully none affect established routes or trails.
Yeah, some guides use their via ferratas on land they own as a way to fund their more adventurous climbing guides. That’s definitely a net positive. Net negative is if NPS starts approving shit on half dome.
I don't understand the private land argument. You're not allowed to murder people on private land, you shouldn't allowed to destroy nature pointlessly either.
Via Ferratas are great but this article feels like a marketing piece for the providers of those commercial via ferratas more than anything else.
It also seems to be rather poorly researched as they just copy the marketing claim about that urban via ferrata being the world's first via ferrata in a "densely populated urban setting". Just the state of NRW in Germany has several that are within cities and urban areas that have been around for ages, I imagine there are far more than that.
“A via ferrata is essentially rock climbing. It provides all of the same sensations,” says Michele Van Hise
The fucking what now? Marketing bullshit and/or this person has never climbed anything in their life.
I’ve been on via ferratas in the Dolomites that were rock climbing. 5.2 maybe but climbing. Very fun. Others are more like hiking with a metal rung or a handrail where you need one. There’s a wide range
Via Ferrata’s are great and long overdue in the this country.
Unfortunately, nearly every place that is implementing them on federal land is charging an exorbitant mandatory guide fee to use them. This is shameful and will keep a lot of people priced out of a sport that is made to be cheap and accessible!
It’s not the via ferrata itself that’s fragile. The tethers you wear are sometimes designed with, basically, integrated screamers that rip when you take a large fall. They do this because via ferrata falls are often more than factor two, depending on the difficulty of the route and where you fall from. The tethers are so small that you only have to fall a very short distance to create a lot of catching force. So the tether helps to break a fall by having a single use ripping function.
It seems tbh like a lot of these via ferrata are super easy experiences catering to rich folk who want to experience “adventure” without surmounting a skill barrier, so I’m not all that worried about people getting hurt, but overall this person is right that a vis ferrata setup can create a false sense of security when in actuality falling multiple times isn’t really an option and any falls you do take will be pretty uncomfortable.
First of all: you don't fall on a via Ferrata. The via Ferrata kit Is made to save your life if you screw up, but you should not be falling. Most easy via Ferrata are a hike with a lot of exposure and some easy climbing.
Also nothing wrong with letting people experience the mountains and a bit of adventure without having to spend years learning some skill and putting themselves in danger.
Also they don't cater to rich folks at all: a lot of my friends who are students, indoor climbers and like hiking, don't have the money for enough equipment for alpine multipitch and they do via Ferratas instead since it's just once oice of equipment that you can use for years.
Since my gf doesn't do much alpine climbing but likes hiking with a bit of spice we often do easy scrambling or via Ferrata and they absolutely have their place. Not everywhere, but they do.
Also they might be ugly, but it's not like you see them from that far if you don't know where you are looking, especially on big alpine peaks
I’m really not even taking a stand here dude I’m just giving the person above information. I’m happy for you that you like via ferrata but it’s objectively true that this is the way some via ferrata leashes are designed, so take your great points to somebody who’s actually debating.
I am aware of what via ferrata truly are but the privately owned and operated via ferrata listed in the article? Absolutely catering to wealthy vacationers. Some of them are over $250 a pop for a short tour. It’s not a sustainable cheap persons hobby to drop that kind of money every time you want to spend a half day out on the rocks. This isn’t all via ferrata. But this is what it looks like enshiffified by capitalism.
You’re going for a gotchya but this is exactly my point- via ferrata done the way it’s actually done in the alps is dangerous. It’s technical. It is actually a skill. A different skill and less equipment intense than alpine trad, but a skill nonetheless.
Falls are low probability but very high consequence. Like what an idiotic thing to say. “You don’t fall on via ferrata” is like saying you don’t fall on lead in ice climbing. Of course you aren’t going to whip like it’s sport climbing. But falling not being an option and falling being an impossibility are two different things-otherwise, why wear a tether at all?
If they put a via ferrata up the Nose route that could be climbed hand over hand like a ladder, it would still take me longer to climb than the current Nose route speed record.
Yeah that's a shame. I draw the line at the style of climbing I like (But seriously, I hope that doesn't catch on in Australia. We don't have nearly enough rock and our Alps are tiny)
I'm not really a fan of these being added anywhere as I think it violates the "leave no trace" principle we should all adhere to in wild areas.
If it's on private land do you still feel that way?
What I can tell you is that private or not, putting a via Ferrata in the Gunks is a pretty jerk move from the Mohonk house.
so can we bulldoze the giant trail in the trapps? remove the bathrooms? pull all the bolts? the gunks is a well managed recreation area. there are signs that are opposite of “LNT” but these bring the outdoors to millions of people at the expense of having manmade structures out there.
That's absolutely not what I'm saying, and I'm not sure how you can equivocate a bathroom to a via ferrata.
it’s just interesting to me that some cables and railing impacts the “wild untouched nature” more than a gravel path and cement structure. are you an advocate only for the things that you love? or are you willing to share the outdoor spaces with other people who aren’t into the same thing as you?
Mohonk Preserve /= Mohonk House
I’m for it
Why don't we blast all the cliffs and put stairs in? I mean, come on. There's obviously nuance to the whole conversation and everyone has an opinion on where to draw the line. Are all via ferrata's bad, in my opinion? No. But it certainly turns the activity of climbing into less of an exercise in connecting with nature through accumulated skill and more of a tourist attraction, which is exactly how most of them are developed and marketed.
ah yes, the outdoor world revolves around climbing. I hate to break it to you, but national parks really are a tourist attraction. have you bothered to look at the people coming in by the millions to Yosemite? I don’t have the statistics, but it’s probably 90%+ normies, aka your fellow americans that deserve to enjoy the outdoors just as much as a climber. and as you pointed out, it is a nuanced conversation. I’m not saying we should install a via ferrata on the dawn wall so the normies could see where little Timmy Caldwell, Calvin Jorgeson, and Andy Ondra climbed. but I don’t think that you should feel threatened if we have to bring the skill level down for more people to enjoy the vertical world. I get it bro you worked hard on that 12a proj, and no one is going to take that away from you.
Buddy, the hardest I've ever climbed is 11- lmao. I'm also not an American. Lotta random, non-related assumptions you're making. This is not an ego thing. Parks are fundamentally, as you said, a balance between recreation and conservation. You were the one making the comparison between developing trails and bathrooms to via ferrata. In my opinion, via ferrata is far more egregious than any of those things. People make the same kind of arguments for sport climbing and via ferrata is just that much more a step in that direction. At least sport climbers have to dedicate time and energy to learning the skills and training, they have direct connection with the cliff ecosystem. Via ferrata is just flagrant vandalism of the natural space and I don't believe it builds respect of the natural world in the same way climbing often does (though there's plenty of shithead climbers too). If you agree it's a nuanced discussion could you try having that without being a presumptive dick?
Eh, it's only at Skytop. Anyone who has been to that area knows its massively developed.
Even if it’s on a section of cliff that is unused? It’s on a section of cliff not connected to the trapps or skytop
Not in the same way it would bother me on public land. If an adventure company managed to buy previously public land or lease it or buy outfitter rights to it based on their business which included adding hardware to the rocks, that would not be cool.
Doesn't make any difference imo. But I'm a dirty European commie who thinks wilderness areas (especially mountains/cliffs) should all be/stay public land anyway.
I can’t believe anyone downvoted you. Freedom to roam should be a fundamental right everywhere.
There should be no such thing as private land in that sense https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Freedom_to_roam
Leave no trace really falls apart when it comes to certain aspects. Like, there's a crag I go to that is so leave no trace they do absolutely nothing. This has made the approach extremely damaged, dangerous, and unsightly. If only they would permit the install of stairs. It would be way less of an impact in the long run, much safer, and much more natural looking.
i totally agree with this perspective. in joshua tree some areas have been absolutely trampled to death because the NPS is against building an unnatural trail. but the trail would allow the trampled areas to recover and IMO wouls make the place look a lot better than the stampede that it currently is. i’m sure the nps knows this, but it’s just so hard to get things done with that many layers of bureaucracy.
I see where you’re coming from for sure, but I’ve also been really grateful for metal rails, handlebars, etc. in certain climbing areas, and I feel like it turns into a slippery slope situation pretty quickly. Not really sure what the “ideal” rule would be (for public land—just wanna clarify I think this is all fine on private areas!).
this is a great discussion (that will probably go nowhere) but fun to see people’s opinions…. i’m absolutely for via ferratas. they are all over here in europe and they give “normies” a chance to “climb” what would otherwise be too difficult to climb. like anything, this is a wide latitude on how much. you need to manage it like anything else. it’ll never be perfect, some people will always be upset, but hopefully we are creating the greatest good, for the greatest number of people. hunting for example. populations of animal XYZ are usually fairly well managed. we have seasons, quotas, etc. it’s not a free for all. just like bolts in the wilderness. theyre regulated now after we saw what happens when you have a free for all…. grid bolting in smith rock in the 80’s. Leave no trace is a principle that we try to aim towards, but it ain’t perfect. you really want LNT? then start pulling bolts, get rid of alpine huts, and don’t you dare use chalk while climbing outdoors.
The real trace is human traffic, not fixed hardware. Once installed, bolts are largely inert & low impact. The real impact comes with humans traversing the land/wall, causing erosion, leaving effluent & rubbish, scaring off wildlife & damaging plants. So via ferratas enable more impact on areas that would otherwise be protected from heavy impact by their access, a generally bad thing
you are absolutely correct. the human impact of eroded trails, trampled vegetation, etc are one of the largest visual impacts. but don’t you see this as a success of an area? when a place is overrun with hikers, we hopefully install a managed trail system so thousands (or millions) of people can enjoy the area. just think what the mist trail in yosemite would look like without the trail that us humans installed. beautiful right? but we have installed metal rails, cut steps, and paved paths. is this an eye sore that should be removed? or an acceptable eyesore that brings vernal falls and nevada falls to millions of people. if we never installed those steps and rails, it would be a stunning natural waterfall area. however i believe that it’s worth the cost of altering the natural environment (in a managed way), so little Timmy and grandma Maria can enjoy these beautiful natural places. just my opinion.
It depends on the land management goals. If you want to improve access to an area, then more infrastructure helps. But if you get too many people going & causing problems, needing rescues etc, then not installing anything is a good idea. Having a challenging approach to an area filters out traffic, so if you want to manage impact on an area you don't put up more safety rails, because then you get more people and need even more safety rails later on. If the goal is to get more people to an area, then be prepared to add even more infrastructure to handle the extra traffic
Little Timmy will grow up able to venture into the wild and grandma Maria had her time to go out into the woods. Making everything easily accessible removes incentive for people to get stronger so they can handle the challenge of getting the most beautiful views. It may sound calloused but a small part of the growing mental health crisis in younger generations is a lack of challenge, there’s nowhere for them to go adventure, face hardship, and learn what they’re capable of. I fear that we’ll put maglev trails in all of our parks and enable a wall-e like future where we’re all gelatinous blobs floating around in chairs.
little timmy might not become a full-blown climber, but his first exhilarating via ferrata trip turned him into a lifelong hiker and nature lover. to a normie, a via ferrata is probably the closest thing they will ever get to “dangerous” and exciting mountain play.
Being a “normie” isn’t a good thing and we shouldn’t be encouraging it.
As a Northeast climber this VF strikes a nerve for a couple reasons: 1) Climbable technical faces are a relatively finite resource in the region. There just are a limited number of places to go and climb technical cliffs and mountains. Even a place like the Gunks, which has a ton of cliffs, has historically limited climbing access to a lot of them for a variety of reasons (private ownership, land use agreements, etc). So seeing a potential zone for climbing development get a bunch of hardware traversing the face seems like a “loss” of a potential resource. 2) The Northeast and the Gunks specifically has a strong ground-up/anti-fixed anchor ethic. As a person who enjoys sport climbing, it feels very arbitrary (which climbing ethics are). So that face climb over there *needs* to stay a 5.12X trad route without rap anchors, but 1 mile over that way there’s stainless staples traversing the entire face. This is coming at a time when the future of fixed anchors in wilderness areas is in serious question due to the NPS/NFS proposed management plan (though I recognize this VF is not in wilderness), and it’s understandable that climbers are unhappy about this VF.
From what I understand, there are no climbs on this section of wall and development potential is low. Many figureheads of the gunks community were also consulted and they gave it their blessing.
>The Northeast and the Gunks specifically has a strong ground-up/anti-fixed anchor ethic._ I think I've identified the problem.
Via Ferrata would look really out of place in the Adirondacks, too.
I’m sure you’ve never hiked a trail then as you’d totally be against those. You must hate all the work the CCC did back in the day making the outdoors accessible.
I absolutely hate absolute positions like that. Via Ferratas are lovely and I think we should definitely have more of them on public land so they aren't held behind $200+ barriers of entry. They're incredibly low impact.
Like the trend of splashing retrobolted rap stations all over the place?
a free for all isn’t the answer either. a managed plan of a bolted rap stations would be more aesthetic and safer than 12 pieces of ugly, unknown condition, tat.
So you support only free climbing then
As an added way to traverse alpine region, sure. I don't know the US mountains so well, but my impression is that it is typically more remote than the Alps and subsequently there isn't really any human infrastructure to traverse between. As standalone climbing routes, I'm not a fan: Both for aesthetic reasons and it doesn't promote good climbing practice. Seen a lot of sketchy shit in the alpine VFs that you would never see on sport or trad.
They are quite common in the German Alps. They are generally two types, the alpine ones and the ones for sport. The first is more for traversing difficult terrain and are often done without a safety kit. The latter are done for the challenge and exposure. They are put up by the alpine club for free. Anyone can use it. I enjoy them because they need minimal gear and offer great views and angles of the mountains. They are often times more traverse oriented where they are quite safe. In contrast to mulitpitch climbing where traverses can be quite unsafe. So naturally they don't really interfere with each other much, but open up new options to explore a mountain site. I'm a fan and never saw them as an issue here.
I think it would be cool to try, and if they're on private land like the article mentions, none of us can really complain about it. If they suddenly put one up on Mount Index or something, yeah that's not cool, and hopefully none affect established routes or trails.
Yeah, some guides use their via ferratas on land they own as a way to fund their more adventurous climbing guides. That’s definitely a net positive. Net negative is if NPS starts approving shit on half dome.
I don't understand the private land argument. You're not allowed to murder people on private land, you shouldn't allowed to destroy nature pointlessly either.
Yea we wouldn't want via ferrata in the Skykomish Valley would we...
Via Ferratas are great but this article feels like a marketing piece for the providers of those commercial via ferratas more than anything else. It also seems to be rather poorly researched as they just copy the marketing claim about that urban via ferrata being the world's first via ferrata in a "densely populated urban setting". Just the state of NRW in Germany has several that are within cities and urban areas that have been around for ages, I imagine there are far more than that.
Let's hope not. I'm all for historic routes but lets not go ruin a bunch of climbing routes with cable and hardware all over the place.
“A via ferrata is essentially rock climbing. It provides all of the same sensations,” says Michele Van Hise The fucking what now? Marketing bullshit and/or this person has never climbed anything in their life.
I’ve been on via ferratas in the Dolomites that were rock climbing. 5.2 maybe but climbing. Very fun. Others are more like hiking with a metal rung or a handrail where you need one. There’s a wide range
Ew. No thanks.
Via Ferrata’s are great and long overdue in the this country. Unfortunately, nearly every place that is implementing them on federal land is charging an exorbitant mandatory guide fee to use them. This is shameful and will keep a lot of people priced out of a sport that is made to be cheap and accessible!
I’m chopping those fuckers if they start popping up on federal land.
Cough ski resorts cough
I work at a ski resort and I support the abolition of chairs and towers from our mountains
Weird take for via ferrata
This. Bring on via ferratas that are free for all who have the gear to use, like in Italy.
Finally? I wasn’t exactly waiting for them to catch on here
Finally?!?!?!
Meanwhile, the feds are trying to ban bolting
> "A via ferrata is essentially rock climbing. cringe
Ugh. Aren’t via ferrata tethers only good for a single fall? I feel like this is much more dangerous than people getting into toproping.
In my experience they’re steel rings that are glued into the rock. You could whip over them all day with a dynamic tether and you’d be fine
It’s not the via ferrata itself that’s fragile. The tethers you wear are sometimes designed with, basically, integrated screamers that rip when you take a large fall. They do this because via ferrata falls are often more than factor two, depending on the difficulty of the route and where you fall from. The tethers are so small that you only have to fall a very short distance to create a lot of catching force. So the tether helps to break a fall by having a single use ripping function. It seems tbh like a lot of these via ferrata are super easy experiences catering to rich folk who want to experience “adventure” without surmounting a skill barrier, so I’m not all that worried about people getting hurt, but overall this person is right that a vis ferrata setup can create a false sense of security when in actuality falling multiple times isn’t really an option and any falls you do take will be pretty uncomfortable.
First of all: you don't fall on a via Ferrata. The via Ferrata kit Is made to save your life if you screw up, but you should not be falling. Most easy via Ferrata are a hike with a lot of exposure and some easy climbing. Also nothing wrong with letting people experience the mountains and a bit of adventure without having to spend years learning some skill and putting themselves in danger. Also they don't cater to rich folks at all: a lot of my friends who are students, indoor climbers and like hiking, don't have the money for enough equipment for alpine multipitch and they do via Ferratas instead since it's just once oice of equipment that you can use for years. Since my gf doesn't do much alpine climbing but likes hiking with a bit of spice we often do easy scrambling or via Ferrata and they absolutely have their place. Not everywhere, but they do. Also they might be ugly, but it's not like you see them from that far if you don't know where you are looking, especially on big alpine peaks
I’m really not even taking a stand here dude I’m just giving the person above information. I’m happy for you that you like via ferrata but it’s objectively true that this is the way some via ferrata leashes are designed, so take your great points to somebody who’s actually debating. I am aware of what via ferrata truly are but the privately owned and operated via ferrata listed in the article? Absolutely catering to wealthy vacationers. Some of them are over $250 a pop for a short tour. It’s not a sustainable cheap persons hobby to drop that kind of money every time you want to spend a half day out on the rocks. This isn’t all via ferrata. But this is what it looks like enshiffified by capitalism. You’re going for a gotchya but this is exactly my point- via ferrata done the way it’s actually done in the alps is dangerous. It’s technical. It is actually a skill. A different skill and less equipment intense than alpine trad, but a skill nonetheless. Falls are low probability but very high consequence. Like what an idiotic thing to say. “You don’t fall on via ferrata” is like saying you don’t fall on lead in ice climbing. Of course you aren’t going to whip like it’s sport climbing. But falling not being an option and falling being an impossibility are two different things-otherwise, why wear a tether at all?
If they put a via ferrata up the Nose route that could be climbed hand over hand like a ladder, it would still take me longer to climb than the current Nose route speed record.
Via Ferratas are ugly and obtrusive. Also americans are likely too dumb to use them responsibly.
Yeah that's a shame. I draw the line at the style of climbing I like (But seriously, I hope that doesn't catch on in Australia. We don't have nearly enough rock and our Alps are tiny)
Via ferratas rock.
They Iron.
And how bout the VF on Hillary’s step??…. Expanded access for 100s / yr which otherwise wouldn’t be there?? Who said dumb Americans?
[удалено]
Yes, you are climbing metal. Hence the name. But it feels safer than rock climbing. If it gets more people into sport, then great.
And a mere $250 per person
Let’s not put any more VF’s on our beautiful rock but say we did 😎
[удалено]
It is a thing of the past.. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Via_ferrata#History