Cable car project in Sète: the subject still makes your head spin!

Le projet de funiculaire à Sète donne lieu aux montages les plus extravagants. Capture écran Facebook Jean Claude Gadenne

Old, the subject inspires as much fear as mockery. Throughout recent history, it has been discussed more or less seriously.

It's an old sea serpent. A cable car in Sète! A fantasy for some. A nightmare for others. The project, old, did indeed exist. In the form of a “file on the table”. Like an idea thrown into the air. A handful of days ago, on social networks, a Sète resident dared to share a photomontage illustrating this old chimera. We see “eggs” following the stairs leading to the Saint-Clair. The photo triggered an avalanche of comments. Sometimes hilarious, sometimes fiercely opposed to such madness.

“How to place cables ? That was not my sense of aesthetics…”

Before even discussing the feasibility of such a project, it must be admitted that it would have an undeniable impact on the landscape. However, cable cars, or funiculars, are no longer content to occupy ski resorts. They are gradually taking over cities, most often for environmental reasons linked to soft travel and/or urban congestion relief. It is in the air. Today, in France, several urban cable cars are already in service. In Brest, Saint-Denis de La Réunion, Grenoble (one of the first urban cable cars in the world), and Toulouse, where it carries up to 8,000 passengers per day. Others are in the pipeline, such as in Créteil, Nice, Bordeaux or Ajaccio…

A project that appeared in the early 1970s

And in Sète? The idea of ​​a cable car appeared “seriously” in the early 1970s. At the time, a project for a panoramic restaurant at the top of Mont Saint-Clair emerged. The idea was accompanied by a cable car to climb up there… Yves Marchand, mayor of Sète between 1983 and 1996, remembers the anecdote. “As far as I can remember, this idea was put forward in 1971 by a candidate for mayor of Sète named Barthas. He was a notary from Castres, I was on his list. I was young!” The project would not go any further. But it would leave a lasting impression. 

Later, the subject would come back to Yves Marchand's ears during his term. "I never considered it very serious, he says today. I didn't see how we could make it compatible with the site. Saint-Clair is everywhere in Sète! How to lay the cables ? That wasn't my sense of aesthetics…" He would have rather imagined relieving congestion in Sète by digging a tunnel from the Tivoli Bridge to the Corniche. But that's another story…

A mention in the 2020-2030 urban transport plan of Sète Agglo

The subject of the cable car in Sète comes up cyclically. There is always a bit of politics behind it all. In 2019, as part of the municipal elections, the LREM committee of Sète launched an online consultation to find out the opinion of the people of Sète on “the installation of funiculars and/or elevators to serve the high points”. Like a bottle thrown into the sea.

And today ? The municipal team in place finds the idea comical. In 2018, however, a consultation workshop, as part of the 2020-2030 urban travel plan for Sète Agglo, suggested to the City to "set up a funicular from the city center to Mont Saint-Clair, for the use of PRMs, but also tourists"… The proposal was no joke. It was not followed up. But who knows if it could not reach new heights during the 2026 municipal elections…

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