They open up the city’s furthest reaches
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Gliding through the sky at a steady 11mph, it allows plenty of time to survey the city’s mountainous bowl and the lunar rock formations that lie around the rim like invading Aymara warriors. It also hints at the social fissures. The Green line, from the upscale and (relatively speaking) low-altitude Zona Sud, passes over a ridge topped by smart, high-walled modern houses.
“They were none too pleased about the opening of the line,” explains local guide, Grace. “Some people have even moved away and left their houses vacant.”
Perhaps it’s this kind of nimbyism that has kept similar transit systems out of other hilly cities – Los Angeles, say, or Edinburgh.
I enjoy the riding as much as the arriving. The yellow line takes me to Sopocachi, a convivial neighbourhood of restaurants, low-slung houses and little bars. The White line, opened in March by president Evo Morales – with an offering to the Pachamama or indigenous “earth mother” – goes to Miraflores, a sometime fruit-growing area turned densely populated barrio. The Blue line hops from Avenida del Libertador – or Chuqui Apu (all 39 cable-car stations have an Ayamara as well as a Spanish name) – to the fascinating historic centre, the highest part of La Paz proper.
Walking the streets of La Paz can prove tiring
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If that’s not high enough for you, try the new Purple line. It stops only once as it whisks me in 8 minutes from downtown to El Alto – 400+ metres (1300+ feet) higher. Formerly a suburb, El Alto is now a city in its own right, home to almost a million people. The new fast track up means backpackers can get to the international airport for pennies. I’d strongly recommend everyone riding up to see Freddy Mamani’s Power Rangers-inspired “cholet” tower blocks – pitched as New Andean architecture – that have been making news in recent years.
In Medellín, Colombia, I’d seen how a cable-car system can have a transformative effect on a city. Residents of marginal areas – usually high places, where land is cheaper and/or less firm – suddenly have easy access to the main centre, and to jobs. They can commute without taking a series of buses or getting up at 4am.
La Paz is the same, but on a massive scale.
The central plaza of La Paz
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“Paceños are really proud of the teleférico,” says Grace. “People travel from El Alto down to the south as tourists, and middle-class people go in the opposite direction. At first, it seemed strange, but the cable-cars make it natural to travel together, to mix more.”
It’s not only the price of the tickets. The quiet up there in the heavens is soothing. The astonishing frequency of services – I counted a gondola arriving every 15 seconds – makes all my years waiting Godot-like for the Tube and rural buses seem like some kind of undue punishment.
But, actually, the cable-car makes all other forms of public transport seem obsolete, as well as very boring – rather as La Paz, shimmering and sprawling beneath snow-capped Mount Illimani, makes megarich London or megasized Beijing, seem rather dull.
See www.miteleferico.bo. Guided ours bookable through boliviamilenaria.com and, in the UK, geodyssey.co.uk.
Source link : https://www.telegraph.co.uk/travel/destinations/south-america/bolivia/articles/la-paz-cable-cars/
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Publish date : 2018-10-11 03:00:00
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