Doppelmayr Constructing Santiago Cable car

High above the treetops of Parque Metropolitano, where Santiago's smog-choked morning commute crawls along the roads below, three station towers and 19 support pylons now trace a silver line across the sky. The Teleférico Bicentenario — Chile's first cable car built expressly as urban public transport, rather than for tourism or ski access — is entering its final construction phase, with authorities eyeing a start of commercial operations in the first months of 2027.

A cable line over the capital's worst bottleneck

The project is a US$80 million concession of the Ministry of Public Works (MOP), running roughly 3.4 kilometres and linking the comunas of Providencia, Vitacura, Las Condes and Huechuraba — an arc across Santiago's northeastern business belt that today relies on congested surface roads squeezed between the Andes foothills and the Mapocho River. Once operating, it is expected to cut travel time between Huechuraba and Tobalaba from around 45 minutes by car or bus to just 13 minutes by cabin.

The system will run on 19 towers carrying 121 cabins, each holding 10 passengers, moving up to 6,000 people per hour in both directions combined — comparable to a busy urban bus corridor, but entirely above the gridlock. Three stations anchor the line: Canal San Carlos, near the Costanera Center mall at the meeting point of Las Condes, Providencia and Vitacura; Parque Metropolitano, at the summit of Cerro San Cristóbal, which also serves as the line's motor station and pivot point; and Santa Clara, inside the Ciudad Empresarial office park in Huechuraba.

From groundbreaking to gondolas in the sky

President Gabriel Boric broke ground on the project in December 2023, telling reporters at the time that the government would push to have the cable car operating in 2026 — a target that has since slipped, but not by much. Construction has advanced steadily since: by November 2025 the project had reached 50% completion, with individual stations ranging from 46% to 58% built out. By March 2026 overall progress had climbed to 75%, and by mid-June, the Ministry of Public Works confirmed 85% completion, coinciding with a milestone event where all 121 Swiss-manufactured cabins — built by Doppelmayr, which holds a 42.5% stake in the concession alongside construction firm Icafal and Ciudad Empresarial — were formally installed on the line.

The rollout has not been entirely without setbacks. In November 2025, the MOP was forced to order the demolition and rebuild of one of the cable car's support bases after a height-related construction error was discovered. Work has continued in earnest since, with the concessionaire's own site logging near-weekly traffic diversions around Providencia, Las Condes, Vitacura and Huechuraba as crews string cable, pour foundations and finish station buildings — as recently as August 3, with new detours established around the works.

What it means for the city

Officials estimate the line will benefit roughly 620,000 residents across the four comunas it connects, offering an alternative to a corridor that funnels tens of thousands of commuters daily between Santiago's eastern residential districts and the office towers of Ciudad Empresarial, one of the capital's largest employment hubs. Authorities have framed the project as a direct response to chronic road saturation in the sector, rather than a novelty attraction

Locally, the project is also being watched as a test case for a wider push into cable-car transit. It runs alongside the smaller Teleférico Pío Nono, a tourism-focused line built by the Ministry of Housing inside the same Parque Metropolitano, which was already more than 95% complete by late 2025. The government has pointed to both as models for future lines under study in Alto Hospicio, Valparaíso and Puerto Montt.

Timeline to launch

With civil works and cabin installation largely finished, the concessionaire is now moving into technical testing, with commercial operations projected for the first quarter of 2027. Fare pricing has not yet been finalized, though officials have signalled the system will integrate with Santiago's existing public transport network — potentially including the capital's bip! card, which underpins the city's Metro and bus system.

If the current pace holds, the Bicentenario Cable Car will become the first urban gondola in Chile dedicated purely to daily commuter transit — a striking new silhouette over Santiago's skyline, and a real test of whether flying over the city's traffic can succeed where widening its roads has not.

The Bicentenario line marks Doppelmayr’s second major cable transit milestone in the Chilean capital this year, following the launch of the updated Pío Nono tourist cable car system in Metropolitan Park.

By lifting transit above congested road networks, urban cable systems continue to gain momentum across Latin America as a cost-effective, sustainable solution for complex topography. The Bicentenario cable car is scheduled to enter public service in early 2027.