Who still stays in a motel?
The canton of Graubünden is celebrating 100 years of automobile traffic on its roads. Motor vehicles were not allowed on the canton's territory until 1925.
Many years ago, I stayed at the El Rancho Motel in Barstow, California, thinking at the time that it dated back to 1927. This would have meant that there was already an infrastructure here in the USA that was built just two years after the end of the driving ban in Switzerland.
Well, I have since learned not only that this motel was only built in the 1940s, but also that the establishment, which has become very run-down since my visit, has since been used as "low-income housing" and - worse still! - a victim of the flames in 2022 and destroyed forever. This means that not only has another witness to the historic Route 66 from Chicago to LA disappeared forever, but one of my important memories of an epic journey from west to east across the USA has also suffered considerable damage.
Motels fascinate
Because even as a child, I was fascinated by a hotel where you could drive right up to the door of your room. In addition, some of these hotels were no longer as good as new in many places back in the 1970s. The reason was quite simple and was due to the expansion of the Swiss highway network. The shorter journey times reduced the need for a place to stop for the night. But what many of these motels still retained in the 1970s was the unmistakable charm of the 1950s and early 1960s. In other words: needle felt carpets in the rooms, furniture with colored melamine panels instead of wood veneer and this subliminal, American look - be it at the reception or in the design of the green spaces around the facilities. Of course, back then I mainly stayed in motels on the outskirts of Switzerland, which is quite a feat when you grow up in central Switzerland. So the solution back then was to take a room in one of these motels, which were mostly located on the main roads, instead of making the arduous journey over an Alpine pass in the dim light of the Bilux headlights - for example from Valais or Ticino.
Aerial view from better times of the Hauenstein, the building, most recently a brothel, was closed in 2012 (© ETH e-pics)
Last traces
Some of these places are now just ruins, such as the house on the Hauenstein, which closed in 2012, having last been used as a brothel. The motel near Sihlbrugg was recently demolished after having served as affordable housing. Others have been converted into apartments or are otherwise long gone.
However, the idea does not seem to be dead at all; a new motel was opened in Fehraltorf in 2006. And the charm of the past - no one needs to explain this to us - is also being cultivated in some places. A good example is the Hotel Vezia near Lugano, with its individual garages right next to the rooms, a motel in the best sense of the word, even if it is not called that. Here, the 1950s style has been elevated to a concept.
But I dream of the old neon lights, the scratchy needle felt floors, the trucks thundering past early in the morning to end the night's sleep and a glass of Heliomalt, the chocolate milk that was served in the restaurant before continuing the journey.
