Riding the rope to Vitosha: Can the Dragalevtsi cable car revive mountain tourism in Sofia?

Following years of delays and a lack of a clear plan for what will be the fate of the Dragalevtsi lift, this month, Vajeni Linii EAD submitted an investment proposal for the reconstruction of the facility. The company is the owner of the Vitosha mountain cable car (near Sofia), which has been out of service since 2017.

Despite the formal investment intention, it will be quite a while, and a number of administrative procedures, before the aerial lift can start transporting tourists again - in the words of Petar Petrov, the lawyer of the concessionaire.

For a year and a half, the (Bulgarian) Forestry Agency has been insisting that we establish a new construction permit for an old facility," says Petrov in a conversation with Economic.bg.

According to him, the project to reconstruct the facility has been delayed so much because of administrative problems.

Now they are forcing us to establish an easement. Today we have a meeting with the Forestry Agency to explain to them that this is not applicable to our case," says Petrov.

Passing the ball

The debates about the responsibility for the reconstruction of the Dragalevtsi cable car, as well as what administrative obstacles there are - and if there are any at all - are fiercely fought on several fronts. According to Petrov, the main problem facing the modernization of the facility in the Vitosha Nature Park is the current Forestry Act, which prohibits the construction of new aerial lifts and ropeways since 2012.

This law has blocked the possibility of new investments in winter infrastructure - not only in Vitosha but also in the whole country," he added.

According to him, legislative changes are needed for the establishment of the easement in question. And it should be clearly mentioned in the law that it is impossible to apply the law from 2012 to old facilities and objects dating back to 1956 (ed. note - when the last amendments were made to the Forestry Act)

The investment in the modernization of the cable car will amount to 8 million euros for the section Dragalevtsi - Bai Krastyo.

History of the Dragalevtsi cable car

The Dragalevtsi cable car was launched in 1956 and stopped working in 2017. It is the oldest mountain ropeway in Bulgaria. The Knyazhevo cable car to Kopitoto (another part of Vitosha) was built in 1962 and stopped working in 1992, after an accident.

At the end of last year, the Bulgarian Supreme Administrative Court upheld the decision of the Administrative Court of Sofia City, which confirmed that the Dragalevtsi aerial lift must be repaired. The subject of the court case is an order of the chief architect of Sofia from 2021, mandating Vajeni Linii EAD - the company operating the aerial lift - to carry out the necessary repair works.

That’s when the concessionaire of the mountain slopes and the Dragalevtsi aerial lift - Vitosha Ski AD - came out with the position that the modernization of the lift had been blocked for more than a year. Now Petar Petrov says that there is still a long way to go before real modernization has been achieved. Even after all the administrative procedures have passed, it will take about 6 months for the lift seats to be delivered from Doppelmayr.

Bigger seats and higher speed

In its investment intention, Vajeni Linii EAD wrote that four-seater cabins are planned, however, their number will be reduced from 100 to 60. The speed of movement will be raised from 2 m/s to 5.5 m/s. This way, the moving capacity will increase from the current 300 people per hour to 1200 per hour.

The length of the facility will be reduced from the current 1707 to 1670 m, due to the technical features of the reconstructed line.

Will the cable car help develop tourism in Sofia?

The modernization of the Dragalevtsi cable car will undoubtedly help the development of tourism in Sofia.

This development was extremely necessary," Dessislava Alexova, a member of the Bulgarian Tourist Chamber, commented to Economic.bg.

According to her, a big problem facing the mountain is its inaccessibility and the accumulation of car traffic on its roads. This is a problem that Petar Petrov also brings up.

The main problem once the aerial lift is built is what its flow regime will be and where the cars will be parked."

Apart from all this, the bad condition of the mountain huts is also a problem for Vitosha tourism, says Alexova.

The successful development of tourism in Vitosha, but also in the entire country, depends a lot on the collaboration of the different sectors involved, she says, giving Italy as an example.

Various stakeholders – tour operators, the municipality, and even PhD students – were involved in the development of the visitor appeal of a mountain near Rome. Whereas in Bulgaria we somehow fail to communicate with each other".

Translated by Tzvetozar Vincent Iolov