Christmas market in Kassel (GER) makes it possible.

A true fairy tale slide was opened at Christmas Market at the end of November in the German city Kassel. 70m long with 4 lanes side by side, this TÜV-certified slide made of precious metal elegantly pulls itself down the many meeting steps. The rapid wavy constructed track is heavily used by young and old. Top speeds of up to 40 Km/h (25 Miles) are reached on specially designed plastic slides. 

Actually, this slide was to be made slippery again with specially produced artificial ice. An ice machine always supplied the slide with fresh ice in the years before Corona - now, in September 2022, Kassel's city council declared that it would not provide electricity for such equipment because of the energy crisis. Already in the past, the cost of electricity for cooling had risen to 9.000 kWh per year - more than many households achieve per year. What now with the fairytale slide? What cost-effective alternative is there?

The operator Sebastian Ruppert contacted Skitrax World and we were able to produce the corresponding hard plastic mats Tubtrax SP for this "ice-slide" at short notice and deliver them on time. Everything went "just in time" and the first test run with TÜV approvals could already be carried out in the third week of November. 37 days the Christmas market is now open and there are already many positive reactions from the drivers. The local newspaper HNA could test the ice slide already one before the start - here link to the original report.

"I was the first at the finish line," exclaims six-year-old Emma as she slides down the fairytale slide on stepped road in Kassel on a plastic sled at midday on Thursday. She beams all over her face. 

"It seemed faster to me than with the ice," says Florian Pohlmann, Emma's father. Before Corona, he was on the ice slide for the last time. The alternative made of plastic was "faster than expected." HNA editor Bastian Ludwig was also convinced by the plastic mats. "There you have no losses." In addition, it is not as cold when sliding down as on ice. In addition, he says, the slide is now not as dependent on the weather as it used to be." Why this is so can be explained. Since ice also changes in consistency with high temperature fluctuations, the slide's gliding behavior certainly changes as well. At plus temperatures, the ice can become very dull and cause the sled to stop well before the end of the slide. But not with the fast Skitrax Tubtrax SP sliding mats. Warm or cold, they're always fast.

The kids and adults like the smoothness of the glide and the operator that his extra investment in the Skitrax plastic mats was the right thing to do. "Maybe there is something good about the energy crisis after all" says Ruppert.