Prague is counting on a cable car from Podbaba, it is supposed to be a temporary solution

Prague - The capital city plans to build a cable car that will lead from Podbaba across the Vltava River around the zoo to Bohnice. Construction could begin in 2023 or 2024, and the cable car is intended to serve as a temporary solution until the tram line connecting Prague 6 and Prague 8 is completed over a new bridge. This was said by Deputy Mayor for Transport Adam Scheinherr (Prague for Themselves) to ČTK. The cable car is expected to have three stations, and its construction is estimated to cost around 1.5 billion crowns.

Currently, traveling by public transport from Prague 6 to Prague 8 requires passing through the city center, which the city leadership claims unnecessarily burdens the transport system. Therefore, there are plans to connect Podbaba and Bohnice by tram, which will run over a new bridge at the tip of Císařský island. According to Scheinherr, the first phase of the route crossing the river to the zoo, including the new bridge, should be completed by 2030. "After 2030, the last tram section Troja - Bohnice is planned," he stated.

In the meantime, however, the city plans to build a cable car, the construction of which is significantly shorter than that of the tram. According to the environmental impact assessment documentation (EIA), it should take half a year. "The cable car is a temporary solution for the most critical section of the connection between Prague 6 - Prague 8 across the water and the hundred-meter table mountain," Scheinherr explained. "I wouldn't want to get ahead of myself with timelines considering how much is still ahead of us, but hopefully, the cable car will already be under construction in 2024," he added.

The city has not yet selected a contractor for the construction; according to the EIA documentation, the cabins will be supported by three cables on five steel poles with concrete foundations at heights ranging from 25 to 44 meters. The cabins are expected to be air-conditioned with reinforced floors to withstand a potential methane explosion in the Central Wastewater Treatment Plant, above which the cable car will run. The stations will be in Podbaba, on the other side of the river in Troja, and in Bohnice near the Krakow shopping center. Contrary to the considered plans, the route will not run above the zoo but around it.

According to information presented in October at the municipal transport committee, the cost of building the cable car is projected to be 1.5 billion crowns, the ride is expected to last seven minutes, and the cabins should be able to transport 2,000 passengers per hour at intervals of less than a minute.

The investment costs for the tram construction are estimated to be five billion crowns, with a similar transport capacity, and the construction is expected to take four years. The city also plans to build another tram line that will connect Podbaba with Suchdol by 2030.

The plan for the cable car construction was originally proposed by the previous leadership of the municipality. The then Transportation Councillor Petr Dolínek (CSSD) also suggested a cable car project from the Vltava to Letná, but this was abandoned. Previous electoral periods have discussed, among other things, a cable car from Smíchov to Pankrác, through Prokop Valley, or from Holešovice to Troja. Currently, there is a funicular in operation on Petřín, and another is located in the zoo in Troja.