 As of the 1970s, the crowd of winter athletes on the Turracher Höhe increased and as a result, the gradient of the federal road was evened out little by little by adjustments of the route.From 1978 until 1980, a new section of the road, which had been affected time and again by avalanches, was opened on the Kornock above the old road, with avalanche barriers.The steepest Alpine road in Europe at times, with a gradient of up to 34% at kilometre 60 (reckoned from Klagenfurt), was also sometimes a test stretch of the automobile manufacturer, Porsche, produced after the Second World War in nearby Gmünd in Carinthia, because of its high demands on automobiles.