The cable car, an attractive urban mobility option in Latin America

In LatAm, the average commuting time from home to work takes more than an hour, with the cities of Bogota (83 mins.), Buenos Aires (76 mins.) and the Metropolitan Area of the Valley of Mexico (71 mins.) being the ones with the longest average commuting time, according to the Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean (ECLAC). At the same time, the commission emphasizes that despite the fact that this region is one of the most urbanized in the world, only 43% of the urban population has convenient access to public transportation (2020). This figure is below the world average (51.6%) and far below the pattern of European and North American countries, where the rate is 90.6%.)

Alongside traditional urban transit modes such as metros, streetcars or BRTs, cable cars have multiplied in the region. Symbol of peaceful, safe and sustainable mobility, this type of transport has become an attractive urban mobility option for municipal governments.  For example, La Paz (Bolivia) has the most extensive urban cable network in the world, with 10 lines, more than 30 kilometers long and an average of 160 thousand passengers per day (World Bank, 2021).

And this is because although each project must evaluate the relevance of the different modes of transport for its particular case, in terms of costs and capacity, cables usually have many points in favor, due to (I) energy savings, (II) savings in CAPEX and OPEX, (III) their integration with the rest of the transport system.

They are sustainable

Locally, the carbon footprint is reduced since direct emissions are zero, as the ropeways run on electricity. Overall emissions depend, of course, on how the host country produces the energy.

In the construction phase, emissions gains are also significant because cement is by far the largest generator of greenhouse gases in mass transit projects. However, when implemented in its area of relevance, TPC allows overcoming obstacles that would often only be possible with the construction of heavy infrastructure (bridge, tunnel or dedicated right-of-way) for any land mode.

Such is the case of the project for the first cable car in the Ile-de-France region, the "Cable A", which will connect the southern suburbs of Paris to the metro (line 8 in Creteil) from 2025, thus avoiding obstacles such as the ring road, high-speed train crossings, streetcars, etc.

In this project Egis is in charge of project management, engineering, as well as turnkey supply of the electrical works related to the transport system. Being part of the consortium that will integrate the stations and the cable car in the urban environment (layout of 5 stations, positioning But beyond the avoided crossing structures, the nature of the TPC requires little cement compared to other modes. With additional work on station construction materials, their use can be minimized (pylon foundations), thus reducing the impact on land use.of cables), design of cabins, reduction of noise pollution (through Egis subsidiary ACOUSTB), universal accessibility and reliability of the technology.