Yes they are the mainstay of downhill ski resorts but I’m more talking about cities. There are a few (aerial) gondolas and trams that have made their way into cities but they are more of a novelty and tourist attraction than a main way to get around. Compared to other methods an aerial tramway seems to travel a route without interference of other things, just needs support towers and a cable which seems a lot easier than things like tracks. And they seem more suited for short point to point ‘hops’ which cities have in abundance, especially when rivers and the like get in the way. But since there are so few there must be a reason why. I would think these would be great in a place like NYC area crossing the rivers, especially the Hudson from Manhattan to NJ, but they only have one in the city, the Rosevelt Island Tram, and that one doesn’t do well.
So why aren’t these things well suited for cities?
There’s one in Manhattan called the Roosevelt Island Tramway. According to the Wikipedia entry it seems that it’s super expensive to insure, and takes a hell of a lot of maintenance. This FAQ about the tram makes it seem super finicky, like they close the tram a few hours a day just to cut down on wear-and-tear.
The Palm Springs Aerial Tramway takes a MONTH off for service each year. That’s a hell of a lot of service needs. And you can’t be doing that when people depend on it for daily transportation.
Since this is IMHO I’m going to say that it’s just not economically feasible for a local government to build, maintain and insure such a means of transportation. Seems like the tourist places are doing it as a way to service customers and make money.
Did anyone mention the Roosevelt Island tramway?
I took it during my visit, but there is a subway stop on Roosevelt Island right at the tram station, and getting into the city on the subway is a lot faster and lets you connect to the subway. So it was fun to ride, but not very useful otherwise. I don’t remember a subway stop on Roosevelt island when I rode the 7 line 50 years ago, so the tram might have been really useful for Roosevelt Island residents back then.
I suspect any reasonable tramway in a city would have to have stops every few blocks, which would make it even slower. Trams are great over wilderness or going up mountains, but I can’t see how they would be very practical in cities.
The one in La Paz, Bolivia, Mi Teleférico, is supposed to be the backbone of their transit system. Of course, it transits a hilly slope connecting to a major part of the metro area, so there is demand based on that…
There is a list of them here. A lot in South America, for some reason - probably because many cities there are hilly.
The Skyride in Spokane, WA is more of a tourist excursion and not transportation.
Roosevelt Island also benefits from having both the tramway and subway connections because there’s no other way to reach it from Manhattan. (The only pedestrian and vehicle access is via the Roosevelt Island Bridge, which connects the island to Queens.)
Portland, OR has the Portland Aerial Tram between Marquam Hill to the South Waterfront District. I’m sure some people use it for commuting but I suspect most people ride it for the view. Realistically, there are few urban areas (in North America, at least) that have a geography that specifically favors aerial trams versus a tracked tram or funicular, and most urban areas are specifically developed around automobile traffic, so trolleys, road trams, and buses make more sense in general, as they have lower maintenance demands, less chance of having someone trapped due to malfunction, and don’t have the liability of someone figuring how to open a door and fall to their death or throw stuff on random pedestrians below.
It takes you between two campuses of OHSU without having to unpark/repark plus cross I-5 in a difficult way. Doesn’t require getting people in and out of wheelchairs and vehicles. Handy for workers and patients. The view is nice, and the convenience in the middle of, say, oncology treatment is better.
There’s one in San Francisco that will take you from street level up to SalesForce Park, which is actually on the roof of the transit center. But that one is IMO effectively a glorified elevator.
Thanks all for the replies so far. I didn’t know about the maintance issues or the insurance, and yes I can see that the speed is comparable low however this got me thinking in a different direction:
and
Makes me wonder if it’s more that a tram is point to point that is what makes it not work so well in a city than the other issues. As Suranyl pointed out that the subway later stopped on Rosevelt Island which made the tram far less useful. So in that case the tram was used primarily to get to the subway, which was superseded by a direct subway access, which is where city dwellers want to be to get to where they are going. So point to point transit may not be ideal for a city if the city dwellers want to go from multi point to multi point, while bottom of the ski slopes to the top of the mountain seems like more of a point to point need and perhaps part of the reason that trams work well in that situation.
The use of trams in South America is interesting through and curious how the city is laid out to take advance of a point to point system.
(Also I know that trams can have multi stops, though that really is 2 or more point to point trams put together. )
In the example, La Paz (elev ~11,500ft), I mentioned above, the system runs ~1,500ft elevation gain up to another city (El Alto, elev ~13,000ft), and as I understand there were few roads that connected the two that weren’t clogged with traffic. In that use case, it makes sense, and certainly, even acclimatized Bolivians would rather not walk or bike up a 1,500ft hill at that elevation.
The other SA cities it’s probably a combination of terrain, narrow streets and colonial-style development that makes building large, car-centered expressways a problem - the aerial trams leave a much smaller footprint for connecting parts of the city.
For a tram to make sense you need a lot of vertical change in a short distance, not a good road connecting the same points, and a need to move people, but not cargo, and only slowly in very small number. Said another way, a very rare circumstance versus the majority of big cities in 2023.
Back in 1880 when a big city had 40K people, a tram that could move a couple hundred per hour was useful. Bump the same city to 5M people and the same tram is useless percentagewise. So it becomes little more than a tourist attraction.
Which is why most urban tramways date from when cities were small.
Unlike a ski lift, you don’t want riders hopping on and off a moving tram in a big city, so you have to stop for every car, like a Ferris wheel. And a tram line can only connect two single points, otherwise it would be stopping continually for every station. Also, unlike a subway car, monorail, bus or ferry, a tram can only hold a handful of passengers in each car. Trams are slow and inefficient compared to every other form of mass transportation, so they really don’t make sense unless absolutely nothing else is feasible.
No, with detachable cabins they slow down at the access points while the other cars continue at full speed. There’s no need to slow the main cable during a ride.
