Driving to St. Moritz: the Vereina car train and the Julier
How do you drive to St. Moritz in winter, and is a Swiss vignette needed?
Two ways in: the Rhaetian Railway's Vereina car train from Klosters Selfranga to Sagliains, or the Julierpass, which the touring club lists among the passes that stay open through the winter. Neither is a green-signed motorway, so on the federal rule neither is charged for the vignette; the motorway that carried you to Graubünden is. Switzerland issues the vignette annually and in no other length, so a single Engadin week buys the same product as a whole season.
The Vereina car transporter
The Rhaetian Railway runs the Vereina between Klosters Selfranga in the Prättigau and Sagliains in the Engadin, through a tunnel 19 kilometres long. The crossing takes about 18 minutes.
It runs all year, on a summer timetable from 1 May to 30 November and a winter one from 1 December to 30 April, and the winter timetable stays in force for as long as the Flüelapass remains shut.
You drive onto the wagon yourself. Drivers of large vehicles are told to stop centred in the middle of the wagon, and in buses and coaches the passengers stay aboard for the crossing.
Arrive with time to load, and measure the roof box against whatever height the wagon allows before you are at the ramp.
The Julierpass, for a driver who wants the road
The Julierpass is the road alternative to the car train, running from Tiefencastel and the Oberhalbstein by way of Savognin to Silvaplana beside St. Moritz, on what secondary sources give as main road 3.
The touring club's pass tables are where the winter contrast comes from: the Julier, the Maloja and the Ofen are listed as passable through the season while the Flüela closes. No cantonal or federal page we could open says the same. The Maloja carries the only road out of the Bergell, which is the reason it is held open, and short closures after heavy snowfall remain possible.
Keep the car train in reserve even when you mean to drive over the top. The Vereina runs whatever the weather is doing to the passes.
No charge on the Engadin approaches
None of the roads named here is a green-signed Autobahn or Autostrasse, and the Swiss charge attaches to those classes alone. On that rule the Vereina loading road, the Julier and the crossing at Martina towards Nauders all sit outside it. That last step is our reading of the federal rule applied to roads BAZG has not classified for us in writing, and its own map of charged roads is where to check it.
Martina, on the Lower Engadin border with Austria, appears in BAZG's list of crossings and their opening hours, and the road from there climbs on into Tyrol towards Nauders.
If the rest of your route uses a Swiss motorway, put the annual Swiss vignette on the car for that part. If it does not, buy nothing at all.
We are an independent service, not the operator. What we add to the official amount is a service fee, itemised before you pay, and on a week that never leaves the Engadin roads there is nothing for either of us to charge you for.