Plans to develop Kenya’s first cable cars to be used to ferry passengers across the Likoni Channel channel in Mombasa are now starting to take shape with engineering survey about to take place. The survey on where to locate landing masts as well as topographical survey is expected to commence in July.
Earlier in the year, the Kenya Ferry Services, the state corporation responsible for passenger conveying across such channels, announced to have given the Ksh 5.8 billion contract to build the cable cars to Austrian Innovative transport systems company Doppelmayr/Garaventa.
Doppelmayr/Garaventa is renowned for technological quality and as a market leader in engineering, operating production plants as well as sales and service centres in over 40 countries worldwide and having built more than 14,800 installations for customers in 92 nations.
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According to Advantage Austria, an Austrian entity that supports international business, Doppelmayr/Garaventa is equipped for the work. The Doppelmayr Group is a manufacturer of ropeways, cable cars and ski lifts and will transfer the technology and operate the system with Likoni Cable Express Limited.
“It is the firm’s flexibility, know-how and pioneering spirit that has made it ideally equipped to meet all the challenges of traditional and new markets even in Kenya,” noted the agency in a statement.
The contract was signed in December between the sponsor of the project Trapos Limited and the Kenya Ferry Services (KFS). Land on which masts to support the cable cars will stand has been identified and the deal to acquire it is in the final phase.
The 22 cable cars will transit the 500 meter channel in approximately three minutes, with a capacity of 38 passengers in each cabin and will therefore carry 11,000 commuters per hour each trip totaling to 180,00 passengers on a daily basis at a fare ranging between Sh20 to Sh100.
The cable cars will come to the rescue of the already overstretched Likoni channel and Mtongwe which are the only connection to the South Coast with the former being used by 330,000 passengers and more than 6,000 vehicles daily.
