Lisbon’s Graça funicular – out of service since the tragedy that killed and injured passengers last year – will reopen “in April” after a technical inspection has confirmed its good structural and operational conditions.
Municipal transport company Carris – a company deeply affected by the crash of the Glória funicular last September – adds that the resumption of operations of the two other ‘elevators’ taken out of service as a precaution last year are still the subject of “study, testing and evaluation”. Their reopening should be “timely”, says a statement released today.
The catastrophic derailment of the Glória funicular in the early evening of September 3 caused 16 deaths and more than 20 injuries – some of them life-changing. It was later established in a preliminary report by the Office for the Prevention and Investigation of Aircraft and Railway Accidents (GPIAAF), that there had been faults and omissions in the maintenance of the historic funicular – including the fact that the cable connecting the two lift cabins, which broke, did not comply with specifications and was not certified for passenger transport.
Six months on, however, the much more modern Graça tourist attraction has been given the ‘all clear’ for returning to business.
Lusa reports that this particular funicular was only inaugurated two years ago (March 12, 2024), 15 years after its construction began. Serving the Mouraria and Graça neighborhoods, the funicular has a single track, consisting of rails and only two stops at the beginning of each journey, with a capacity to transport a maximum of 14 people per trip, which lasts about a minute and a half.
It was initially planned to be managed by Carris, but at its inauguration it was announced that management would be the responsibility of EMEL – the Lisbon Municipal Mobility and Parking Company. However, in January 2025, Lisbon City Council approved the transfer of the Graça’s management from EMEL to Carris, both companies being municipal.
According to Carris, the actions taken by the independent technical commission created to analyse Lisbon’s funiculars and lifts in the aftermath of the Glória disaster, included studying all the technical documentation for the Graça funicular project and construction: conducting on-site inspections and specific tests, holding meetings with specialised entities, comparing the funicular with the practices of other equivalent systems, including a technical meeting with those responsible for funiculars in Catalonia (Spain), as well as assessing compliance with the European Union Regulation and other applicable technical and legal framework.
Source material: LUSA
