Proposed Funicular for Nago and Torbole Enhances Transport and Tourism

Two towns, two levels. Nago above and Torbole below. Connecting them has always been a recurring aspiration. Naturally, with an alternative link to the existing (and chaotic) motorized road traffic.

Now architect Cirillo Tonelli revisits and strengthens his idea of a lift. Nothing better, considering it would be the only real way to connect the cycling route between Mori and Torbole.

Anyway, here is the solution proposed by the professional.

The architect’s proposal

“Recently, articles have appeared in local newspapers recording intentions and plans to build elevators, cable cars, etc., in the Alto Garda area to reach monuments and scenic spots. Riva has long been engaged in a project to build an ‘escalator’ to the Bastione, Arco, with something similar to reach the Castle. All these projects are to be realized with substantial public funding.

These projects are certainly interesting and deserve attention because they expand and integrate the tourist offer and bring into operation works and interventions previously undertaken.

However, I believe that if public funds are to be used to build ‘lifts’, cable cars in Alto Garda, certain priorities must be considered. These should be aimed at the overall capacity of the tourism sector, but also at making significant improvements in the transportation system and, if possible, better utilizing the territory.

If an ‘elevator’ is to be built urgently in our area with public money, it should be the one connecting Via Strada Granda in Torbole with Via de Bonetti in Nago: a funicular along the Molin valley or passing above the highway tunnel along the ascent to Nago.

This intervention will be not only a magnificent mobile balcony offering wide views of the lake but also the missing link in the connection of alternative roads between Vallagarina and Alto Garda.

The cycling path around Lake Loppio effectively ends in Nago. A family from the Adige Valley with children on bikes stops in San Giovanni because they will never safely brave the descent toward Torbole and the strenuous climb on the return.

From articles published a few days ago, we learned how important bicycle mobility is, so much so that currently, it has a tourism-economic significance greater than windsurfing.

This alone would suffice to understand that such an work would have supra-municipal, indeed provincial, characteristics. Overall management costs would surely be lower than purely tourist cable cars, and in this regard, some feasibility project hypotheses have already been developed.

The first entity to undertake the realization of this primary work should be the Comune di Nago-Torbole, simply because it would reorganize its territory urbanistically and allow optimal use of all public works it has and plans to build in both towns.

But little hope is placed in the current municipal administration. It is hoped that, if anything is to be realized, it will be thanks to the coordination capacity of the Province through its departments of public works, transport, environment, and tourism.

This ‘provincial’ project deserves priority in public funding.