Paris Opens Europe’s Longest Aerial Gondola Line

Paris unveiled Europe’s longest aerial cable car line, a system of 105 gondolas that is expected to carry roughly 11,000 passengers per day. “At 4.5 kilometres long, the route links Métro Line 8 in Créteil to Villa Nova in Villeneuve-Saint-Georges, and passes through Limeil-Brevannes and Valenton on the way.” For reference, the world’s longest cable car line, located in Bolivia, is over 32 kilometers long. The new line, Câble C1, is France’s seventh urban cable car. Others operate in Toulouse, Brest, and Saint-Denis de La Réunion.

As Sophie-May Williams reports in Metro, the cable car’s total journey takes about 18 minutes, compared to roughly 40 minutes by bus or car. “Grégoire de Lasteyrie, Vice President for Transport of the Île-de-France regional council, said the €138 million project was a cheaper alternative to building subways to connect the isolated neighbourhoods.” 

Paul Herriotts, Professor of Transport Design at Coventry University, says a similar system could work in London, if designed thoughtfully. There, one gondola experiment built for the 2012 Olympics proved to only serve tourists, flopping as a real mode of transport for local residents.