Santiago cable car test begins

Santiago—Yesterday, Luis Abinader pressed the test button to turn on line one of the Santiago Cable Car from the operations control located in the Central Station building on Las Carreras Avenue, where the president could appreciate the infrastructure’s progress.

Abinader expressed that this work and the monorail are part of the Integrated Transportation System, which will cause a fundamental transformation. He added that he is not exaggerating if he says that it is a revolution in the transportation of Santiago to turn it into a model city.

“We are testing the Cable Car that will reach station two and we will have two months of testing to have a robust and safe system and around the second week of February, we will come to ride on the Santiago Cable Car,” said the president visibly excited by the progress of the work.

Abinader, who was accompanied by Jhael Isa, executive director of the Trust for the Development of the Mass Transportation System of the Dominican Republic (Fitram), said that the ferry will be able to move 72 thousand people daily in Santiago, which will help to improve traffic in the heart of the city.

The ceremony was also attended by provincial governor Rosa Santos, senator Eduardo Estrella and the director of Proindustria, Ulises Rodríguez, among other government officials.

The Santiago cable car will pass through the city’s most congested areas, impacting nearly 122,894 inhabitants.

Initially, the system will be running on the section of the tractor cable that goes from Station 1 of the Central Terminal to Station 4 of La Yaguita del Pastor.

According to Fitram, once the system is turned on, international technicians will start the testing and certification process of the system through different loading scenarios: empty cable tractors, empty cabins, and weighted cabins.

“These load scenarios are required by the cableway systems to validate the safety of the project’s users. This period will last two months,” he said.

He explained that the validation of the test period will be carried out by the French company Verita. This organization validates and certifies the safety of this mobility project before it starts operating.