Construction site of the Bouzareah Télécabine. Image via Imageshack.
Of all the Urban Gondolas / Téléphériques / Télécabines in Algeria, perhaps the most exciting right now is the Bouzareah Télécabine. The reason is fourfold:
ONE – This system is actually under construction and has been for at least the last year. That suggests it should be nearing completion any time now.
TWO – From what we understand, this will be the first Gondola system built in Algiers. The five previous systems that were built/rehabilitated in Algiers were all Aerial Trams. This is a step in the right direction as Gondola technology is arguably more suitable to complex urban environments than Aerial Tram technology (for a discussion on this matter, see here).
THREE – We can actually find research on it. That may sound like a poor reason to name something “the most exciting,” but given the lack of available research on the Algerian Gondolas, it’s exciting enough for us. Granted the research is in the form of poorly translated SkyscraperCity Forums (this one was particularly enlightening), but those forums led us to images like these:
Bouzareah Télécabine construction site. Image via Imageshack.
Close-up of Bouzareah Télécabine construction site signage. Image via Imageshack.
User-created map of the Bouzareah Télécabine route showing tower locations, route and station locations. Image via Imageshack.
Which leads us to the fourth reason to get excited:
FOUR – This is a fairly robust system. True, it only has three stations. But on the flip side, it’s almost 3 km in length and has an extreme turn at Station Frais Valon.
A last point: From the above images, we also learn that the system is being built by Garaventa of Switzerland. It’s therefore likely to be designed similarly to past Garaventa-built systems in Tlemcen, Constantine and Skikda.