The Graça Funicular, one of Lisbon’s most important means of transport—and tourism—already has a date set for its return to service: April.
An Independent Technical Commission has finally validated all the necessary structural conditions of the equipment after months of rigorous auditing.
Priority: ensuring total safety
The reopening of this means of transport, which runs betweenGraça and Mouraria, more specifically from Largo da Graça (next to the Sophia de Mello Breyner Andresen Viewpoint) to Rua dos Lagares, comes seven months after the enormous tragedy of the Elevador da Glória.
What now guarantees the safety of this funicular, as will be the case with the reopening of other equipment of this type that is still to be assessed, or under assessment, is the technical validation that presented a report based on three pillars:
- Support from experts
- International benchmarking
- European compliance
According to Rui Lopo, chairman of the board of CARRIS,
What is missing for the inaugural trip?
While the transfer of management of this equipment from EMEL to CARRIS is still underway, the operator is already on the ground preparing for this return, and every effort is being made to ensure that the Graça Funicular starts operating in April.
Until then, certain procedures are necessary, such as additional testing of all the system’s equipment, updating self-protection measures, and reviewing the technical training of the operators who will be in charge of the funicular.
After that, all that is needed is final authorization from the IMT – Instituto da Mobilidade e dos Transportes ( Institute for Mobility and Transport) , the competent regulatory body, for the elevator to start running up and down again.
It should be noted that this is the first of the equipment to receive positive approval from the total number of elevators and lifts in our city, which will also be evaluated by this Independent Technical Commission.