The other day I was in a meeting with some automotive type people to help a friend find products to sell to car companies and a German gent, who was there to sell technologies, sprang a cable car rapid transport system on us
They've spoken to Gadkari, it seems, who is extremely enthusiastic, and are in talks to build a ropeway from Mumbai's Bandra to Kurla (both hell holes and insanely difficult to get to from one place to the other). They said they had implented it in La Paz, Bolivia, and that it was a terrific solution for cities with infrasturcture problems, such as too little land available to build rapid transport systems. Sounded like an awesome solution for a chronically congested city like Mumbai. Here are the pros 1. Very small footprint 2. Low capital cost (some 5m euro per km) 3. Silent, non polluting 4. Driverless, requiring few people to run 5. Can carry 10K people per hour 6. A great touristy experience, to boot Here's a piece in the guardian that speaks more coherently about this http://www.theguardian.com/travel/2015/jun/06/urban-cable-cars-cities-tourist-attractions I hadn't heard about this at all but seeing the mess that is Mumbai, and the humongous problems that the Metro project ran into when they built the one from Andheri to Ghatkopar, I wonder if this isn't the way to go. Thoughts? -- Narendra Shenoy http://narendrashenoy.blogspot.com
