#crowds

#crowds

On my first day in Milan for the 2026 Winter Olympics, I wandered to the heart of the city to admire the stunning marble facades of the Duomo and window-shop through the Galleria Vittorio Emanuele II. The Piazza del Duomo was filled with Olympic spectators decked out in their countries' colors, and on one end, a long line snaked outside the official Milano Cortina 2026 Megastore, with hundreds of customers waiting to buy some of the event merch.

While weather and snowpack obviously influenced snow and terrain quality, they also directly control crowd distribution. The most obvious example is early season when coverage is thin and only a few front side runs are open. Every person on the mountain ends up lapping the same narrow footprint of snow. Once the snowpack sets and resorts move into the core winter, different issues arise.