Most people only know cable cars from the mountains. But transport experts have long said that cable cars could also be an important addition to local public transport. Instead of standing in a traffic jam, just hover over it. More and more large cities are now experimenting with this and hope to better network their transport routes with Alpine technology.
Perhaps the most modern cable car in the Alps is in Grindelwald and shows what is technically possible today. Not only is it particularly wind-stable and extremely fast, it also proves what the best networking can look like: In the valley, you change directly from the train to the cable car, and once you have reached the top of the mountain, you continue straight up with the cog railway Jungfraujoch.
Berlin got a cable car for the Federal Garden Show in 2017. It is true that this leads over a small hill that separates two quarters from each other. But the city planners missed the chance of a real urban cable car there. It is only half-heartedly connected to the local transport network and thus remains just a tourist cable car.
Things are different in Toulouse. The technology transfer from the Alps to the city seems to have worked there. A new cable car has just been inaugurated in France’s fourth-largest city, connecting two transport hubs and crossing a mountain and a river in the process. Given this topography, neither bus nor tram would be competitive.
Latin America has the world’s largest public transport cable car networks. Mexico is currently expanding its routes. Because tight cash registers and limited space hardly allow any other means of transport in the suburbs that have grown quickly and haphazardly. And the lines that have already been completed have not only improved traffic, but also boosted the economy and reduced crime in the surrounding districts.
In the meantime, work is being done on the cable car of the future in the Alps: it should be able to drive individually and autonomously. The Bartholet company is developing a cable car for the Flims – Laax ski area in which the cabins are no longer simply lined up like on a string of pearls. Instead, the gondola will head for the exact station the passenger has selected while passing other stations. It is only these new technical developments, combined with tried and tested technology, that make cable cars so attractive for cities in the fight against traffic gridlock.