Post by Steven Dale
With most traditional transit technologies, there is little consideration about the variations within that technology. A bus is a bus; a streetcar is a streetcar; and a subway is a subway. Sure, there’s variation between suppliers and models, but those differences are negligible compared to the overall technologies themselves.
That’s one of the real competitive advantages traditional transit technologies possess over cable: Understanding them is simple, and that makes them highly attractive to time-constrained planners, policy-makers and politicians.
Cable is not so simple. While the basic concept behind all the modes remains the same (a vehicle propelled by a moving cable), the variations between the modes tend to cause confusion. Beyond the 4 major families of Cable-Propelled Transit (Gondola, Aerial Tram, Funicular, Cable Car), there exists a wide range of cable transit modes, each with its own advantages and disadvantages.
The key to cable is understanding the strengths and weaknesses of each respective mode and then matching the right mode to the right environment. It’s kind of like pairing wine with food: You’ve got to know the subtleties to do it right.
Over the coming months, I’ll describe these modes and give appropriate examples (probably one per week). But to begin with, let’s just get an idea of how many different modes there are:
- Monocable Detachable Gondola (MDG)
- Bicable Detachable Gondola (BDG)
- Funitel
- Pulsed Gondola
- 3S
- Funicular
- Traditional Funicular
- Cincinnati Funicular
- Hybrid Funicular
- Aerial Tram
- Funifor
- Cable Car
- MiniMetro
- Cable Liner
- Cable LIner Shuttle
There are other modes, too, but these are the major ones. Like I said; it’s just not as easy as “a bus is a bus.”
Proceed to Technologies Module, 2: MDG
Want more? Purchase Cable Car Confidential: The Essential Guide to Cable Cars, Urban Gondolas & Cable Propelled Transit and start learning about the world's fastest growing transportation technologies.
Want more? Purchase Cable Car Confidential: The Essential Guide to Cable Cars, Urban Gondolas & Cable Propelled Transit and start learning about the world's fastest growing transportation technologies.
