Germany’s Last Glacier Ski Resort Disappears as Zugspitze’s Platt Lift is Torn Down

An era in German winter sports is drawing to a close as the final ski lift on the Zugspitze glacier area is being dismantled this week — a sad sign of how climate change is reshaping alpine landscapes. Operators of the Bayerische Zugspitzbahn AG began taking apart the Platt Lift on March 20, after more than half a century of service. Opened in 1967, the lift had long carried skiers over the Northern Schneeferner, one of Germany’s last glaciers, but the rapidly receding ice has made safe operation impossible. For the last two years the lift did not operate—its last season was 2023-24.

• Related: The Glaciers Aren’t Melting—They’re Collapsing

The Platt Lift was the last lift on the glacier itself, and its removal means Germany now effectively loses its only true glacier ski area. Earlier lifts in the glacier zone — including the Gletschersee dra,  a chairlift on the Southern Schneeferner, and the Schneefernerkopf lift  — have already been dismantled, as shrinking ice made them unsafe or untenable.

With a little blast of TNT, the Platt Lift’s cabled were blown apart on Friday, which caused the towers to collapse. Bayerische Zugspitzbahn AG shared the video of the lift’s dismantling on its social media channels. Unlike other lifts, the Platt Lift did not have concrete bases for the towers but these were simply buried in the glacier ice. This will make taking down the remnants much easier. With the dismantling, the end of glacier skiing in Germany is official.

Sadly, the glaciers on Zugspitze have been in retreat for decades. Historical measurements show that the Northern Schneeferner’s surface shrank from around 40.9 hectares in 1979 to just 9.4 hectares by late 2025, and some forecasts suggest it will no longer qualify as a glacier at all by the end of the decade.

A recent study documents the near-complete disappearance of the Schneeferner glaciers on the Zugspitzplatt. The two glaciers, Nördlicher and Südlicher Schneeferner, have been monitored since the late 19th century and represent Germany’s last significant glacier ice reserves.

From a combined mass of 52 megatons in 1892, less than one megaton remained by 2023 — a loss of 98%. Südlicher Schneeferner was effectively classified as dead ice by 2022, while Nördlicher Schneeferner is projected to vanish entirely around 2030. The rate of ice loss at Zugspitzplatt since 1999 is 88%, more than double the Central European average, reflecting how smaller glaciers are disproportionately vulnerable to rising equilibrium line altitudes.

While the deglaciation at the Zugspitze signals significant environmental change, the ecological and economic impacts are limited: biodiversity threats are minimal, and Germany’s highest peak will continue to attract visitors even as the glacier and ski lift vanish.

Across the Alps, similar patterns are playing out: glaciers shrinking, ski seasons shortening, and summer snow increasingly rare. These losses reflect broader global warming trends that have driven a long-term decline in ice mass and coverage throughout Europe’s mountain regions. While the end of glacier skiing on the Zugspitze marks the close of an era in Germany, it stands as a stark warning that the days of other glacier resorts are numbered.