28 December 2011

Medellín Escalator ~ Comuna 13's New Pathways!

Excellent to see Medellín residents in the Comuna 13 district Las Independencias I neighborhood benefiting from their new outdoor escalator system! Six sections of automated uplifting Connection Pathways take people from below to 28 storeys (130 meters) up in 6 minutes instead of the 35 by stairs. Hispanically Speaking News reports the escalators...
"...were inaugurated Tuesday by Medellín Mayor Alonso Salazar and the Urban Development Company, or EDU, that tackled the joint initiative four years ago. [...] The project, with a cost of 10 billion pesos (about $5.2 million), involved the Japanese company Fujitec, which designed the escalators and manufactured them at its plant in China, along with Conservicios, a local firm responsible for importing and installing the parts. [...] It’s a “transit solution that will give residents a better quality of life,” Campuzano said. EDU is a decentralized industrial and commercial organization of the municipality of Medellín, the provincial capital of Antioquia and the second most important city in Colombia. The escalators are not the first in the world to be installed outdoors, since there are several for purposes of tourism, but this is a first for urban transport. [...] The work as a whole includes 1,102 sq. meters (11,846 sq. feet) of public spaces, 343 meters (1,125 feet) of pedestrian walks, two public buildings -- one of them with a terrace overlooking the city -- plus benches and other urban furnishings."
Very interesting to consider this in light of the Hong Kong Mid-Levels Escalator project I wrote about a few weeks ago. Anyways, here's reporting from the scene of the unveiling...

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