Amasya and the Idea of a Cable Car

Amasya is often described as the only large city in Anatolia built inside a deep, narrow "V"-shaped valley. The Yeşilırmak, which forces its way between mountains running east to west and in places approaching two thousand metres, meets the Tersakan stream where the city stands and opens out into a broad basin ringed by high hills. On the northern side of this basin rises Mount Harşena, a sharp, cone-shaped mass of limestone; the castle walls, the rock-cut tombs of the Pontic kings and the riverside Yalıboyu houses descend from its foot towards the river in tiers. On the opposite bank, to the south of the valley, stands Ferhat Hill (Ferhat Tepesi), looking down on the city. The relationship between these two heights defines the essential view of Amasya: the place from which Harşena and the rock tombs can be seen in their full grandeur is the slope across the valley.

In a landscape of this kind, the wish to see the city from above turns naturally into a question of transport. Ferhat Hill has long served as a picnic and excursion spot, yet a proper road to the summit has never been fully built. Cutting a new highway through the narrow valley would have damaged slopes protected as a natural heritage site and added fresh pressure to the city's traffic. A cable car was seen as an answer to both problems at once: a ropeway system that leaves its mark on the terrain with only a few towers and two stations, carrying passengers over the valley to the summit in a matter of minutes. The story of the Amasya cable car is the story of how this idea resurfaced again and again over more than half a century, and how it was gradually given shape through plans and figures.

A Municipal Dream of Half a Century

The history of the cable car idea in Amasya rests more on local memory than on documents. Presenting the project to members of the city council in the summer of 2022, the then mayor Mehmet Sarı said that thirty-six mayors had served in Amasya since 1923 and that almost every mayor after the 1960s had dreamed of a cable car. The remark gives no precise starting date for the idea, but it shows clearly that the cable car had remained on the agenda in Amasya across several generations. No written project from those years appears in the available sources; the thinking of the period is known today only through oral accounts of this kind.

The dream began to be set down on paper in the 2010s. The first concrete step was a zoning plan. Conservation-oriented master and implementation zoning plans were drawn up for an area of Amasya's central district lying within a first-degree archaeological and first-degree natural heritage site, covering together the "Cable Car Project between Amasya Castle and Ferhat Mountain" and the Amasya Castle "Tunnel Project". The Ministry of Environment and Urbanisation approved them on 1 July 2016, and on 29 July 2016 they were put on public display for thirty days. In this first plan the two ends of the line were defined as the castle and Ferhat Mountain, the two landmarks of the city. That the same plan also included a tunnel project was no coincidence: in those years the road tunnel to be driven beneath Mount Harşena and the cable car were conceived as two parts of the municipality's vision for reshaping the city.

A possible confusion of names deserves attention here. The road tunnel of roughly one kilometre that runs beneath Mount Harşena, linking the Nergiz neighbourhood with the junction in the Kurşunlu neighbourhood, was also named the Ferhat Tunnel. The municipality explained that it chose the name in honour of Ferhat, who pierced mountains for his love of Şirin. Although the tunnel appeared in the same planning file as the cable car, it is a separate structure; its cost was announced as about 35 million lira, and it was announced that Prime Minister Binali Yıldırım, who had laid its foundation stone, would open it. In January 2017 the then mayor Cafer Özdemir, explaining that the tunnel could enter service around the middle of the year, also noted that work on the cable car project was continuing.

Ferhat Hill and the Origin of Its Name

The hill that is the cable car's destination takes its name from Amasya's best-known folk tale. According to the story, Ferhat is a young artist-decorator (nakkaş) who adorns pavilions and palaces. While painting the decorations of a pavilion built for Şirin, the sister of Mehmene Banu, sultan of Amasya, he sees Şirin and the two young people fall in love. When Ferhat asks for Şirin's hand, the sultan is unwilling to give her sister away and sets an impossible condition: water must be brought to the drought-stricken city from the distant Elma Dağı. Ferhat takes up his pickaxe and sets about splitting the rocks. When the channel is nearly complete, an old woman sent by the sultan brings word that Şirin has died, saying that she has brought along the halva made for Şirin's funeral. Ferhat flings the pickaxe into the air; it falls on his head and he dies on the spot. Hearing the news, Şirin runs to the rocks and, finding Ferhat lifeless, throws herself down. The two lovers are buried side by side where they died; it is said that every spring two roses bloom on their graves, and a blackthorn growing between them prevents the roses from meeting.

The place to which the legend is tied is an ancient water channel visible along the foot of Ferhat Mountain. Known as the Ferhat Water Channel, this structure actually dates from the Late Hellenistic or Early Roman period. It is a channel about six kilometres long, built to supply the water needs of ancient Amasya by carving the rock, opening tunnels, raising walls here and there and following a levelling system suited to the slope of the land. The two-kilometre stretch in the Ferhatarası area, running parallel to the highway, can still easily be seen from outside. The channel's position at the foot of the mountain led the folk tale to attribute this stonework to Ferhat's pickaxe, and the hill took its name from the story. The inclusion of a "Ferhat and Şirin presentation area" in the summit plans of the cable car projects reflects a wish to carry the line's link with this story to visitors as well.

Development Agency Support and the First Tender Attempt

The economic groundwork for the project was prepared with the support of the Central Black Sea Development Agency (OKA). In July 2018 two contracts were signed between Amasya Municipality and the agency under its tourism infrastructure programme: one for the "Redesign of Yavuz Selim Square for the 21st Century Project", the other for the feasibility study of the "Amasya Ferhat Hill Cable Car and Natural Living Area Project". The contracts were signed by Mayor Cafer Özdemir and the agency's secretary general Mevlüt Özen. Özen announced that, under the same programme, investments of forty million lira would be carried out through thirty-three projects in Amasya, Samsun, Çorum and Tokat.

The first tender for the cable car was announced the same summer. At this stage the line was designed to be 1,488 metres long, running between the city centre and Ferhat Hill. The facility was to be built by an investor and transferred to the municipality after twenty-five years of operation, and the tender was scheduled to take place on Tuesday, 14 August 2018, in the municipal council chamber. No information has been found indicating that this tender resulted in a contract; the fact that the project was taken up again in later years with a new feasibility report and a different tender suggests that the first attempt did not lead to construction.

The 2020 Pre-Feasibility Report

In November 2020 the Central Black Sea Development Agency, under the coordination of the Ministry of Industry and Technology, published the "Amasya Province Cable Car Line Installation Pre-Feasibility Report". The report was prepared to give investors an idea of the opportunity and to serve as a basis for more detailed studies later, and it remains the most comprehensive document setting out in figures what the cable car would mean for Amasya. It clearly defines the line's two stations. The lower station was envisaged within the city, on the site of a 3,107-square-metre open car park owned by the Special Provincial Administration, right beside the Yeşilırmak. The upper station is on Ferhat Hill, on an area of about 250 decares owned by the Treasury. The stations were named "Amasya Stop" and "Ferhat Hill Stop".

The line designed in the report is about 1,500 metres long and was to be carried on three towers. Its destination is Ferhat Hill, lying some 500 metres above the city, used for picnics because of its panoramic view and intended to become a centre for outdoor sports and tourism in the future. In this first draft the system was conceived as a line operating with two vehicles of sixty passengers each, at five-minute intervals, able to carry one million passengers a year. The operating speed was calculated at 18 kilometres per hour and the one-way journey time at 4 minutes 46 seconds. An operating day of 1,080 minutes, that is eighteen hours, was foreseen, of which six hours were assumed to be peak time. On this basis the line would make 174 trips a day and more than 56,000 a year. The report states that the ropeway could be either a gondola or a 3S gondola system, stressing that in both types all connected parts and equipment are designed in duplicate and independently of one another, providing a high level of safety even over long spans and in bad weather.

The cost of the investment was put at 11 million US dollars: one million for the construction of the line and stations, and ten million for the supply and installation of the mechanical and electrical components of the cable car system. Construction was assumed to take two years and operation twenty-five years, and it was calculated that fifteen people, including a system manager and an operations engineer, would be employed at the outset. Assuming a one-way fare of two dollars rising by five per cent a year, the investment was expected to pay for itself in fourteen years. The report anticipates that, as in similar projects in Turkey, the main components of the ropeway would be supplied by foreign manufacturers and installed on a turnkey basis. To this end, it notes, on-site studies were carried out with the Swiss firm Bartholet, the Austrian Doppelmayr and the Italian Leitner Ropeways, and their views were sought in preparing the preliminary design and technical specifications.

The most striking part of the report is its demand forecast. Visitor numbers at museums and archaeological sites in Amasya run by the Ministry of Culture and Tourism were examined, showing that Harşena Castle and the Tombs of the Pontic Kings received the most visitors; in 2019 the castle was visited by 88,516 people and the rock tombs by 81,003. The fact that the Tombs of the Kings are a regular stop on tour programmes, their proximity to the planned lower station and the single composition they form with the panorama of Ferhat Hill across the valley were taken as grounds for assuming that their visitors would also want to see Ferhat Hill. Residents of the city were counted alongside tourists; it was assumed that the 15–29 age group would go up the hill two and a half times a year and the 30–69 age group twice a year. On this basis the line was expected to reach about 378,000 passengers in its first year of operation, or 756,000 journeys counting both directions, with the number of journeys exceeding 793,000 by the fifth year. The report also anticipates that, together with the illumination of Amasya Castle, a new tourist activity would emerge extending into the evening hours, especially in summer.

The report's environmental assessment is brief but significant. Since ropeway transport systems do not appear on the lists of the Environmental Impact Assessment Regulation, it states that obtaining an exemption letter from the provincial directorate is sufficient for such an investment. It also notes that there is no proper road leading up to Ferhat Hill; the cable car is presented as an option that would eliminate the construction cost of such a road, its environmental impact, its maintenance expenses and its traffic accidents. Within the report's general framework Amasya is mentioned as one of the fifteen brand cities identified in Turkey's Tourism Strategy 2023, and the cable car is expected to add a new activity to cultural tourism and encourage visitors to stay longer in the city.

Examples in the Black Sea Region

The feasibility report compares the Amasya project with similar facilities elsewhere in Turkey. Turkey's first cable car, the Bursa Teleferik, was built in 1963; after its renewal by Leitner Ropeways in 2014 it became the longest line in the country at nine kilometres, setting a record in 2018 with 1.1 million passengers, roughly half of them foreign visitors. The example closest to Amasya is the Amisos Hill cable car in Samsun. Built in 2006, it is regarded as the first cable car in Turkey used solely for tourism. The 320-metre gondola line has six vehicles; it reached 1.8 million passengers in its first four years, and its annual average has exceeded 500,000.

The facility the report considers most similar to Amasya's is the Boztepe cable car in Ordu. Opened in 2011, this line serves Ordu, which lies on the same tourism corridor as Amasya and is one of the main stops on Black Sea cultural tours, providing access to Boztepe, the hill that serves as the city's viewing terrace. The 2,350-metre line with twenty-one vehicles is travelled in about eight minutes on average and carried 796,000 passengers in 2019. The report notes that in the case of Boztepe the variety of activities offered by the cable car increased overnight stays in the city; this is the effect expected for Amasya as well. Ferhat Hill, like Boztepe, is a viewpoint that shows the whole city at a glance, and the value of the cable car lies in making that viewpoint accessible.

The 2022 Project: Gondola System and Summit Development

The project took its final form in 2022. Before that, on 18 January 2021, a contract had been signed between the Amasya branch of the General Directorate of Forestry, part of the Ministry of Agriculture and Forestry, and Amasya Municipality for leasing to the municipality the right to operate Ferhat Hill as a type B recreation area. This established the legal basis for building revenue-generating facilities in line with the recreation area regulations on the forested parts of the hill. In August 2022 municipal teams prepared the site where the cable car project was to be implemented.

According to the municipality's announcement, the new line would start from the municipal open car park, end at the summit of Ferhat Mountain and be 1,553 metres long. Unlike the two-vehicle draft of the 2020 report, the system was designed as a gondola: twenty-two eight-person cabins with panoramic views and a capacity of a thousand passengers an hour. Because the cabins of a gondola system circulate continuously on the rope, passengers can arrive at the station and board without waiting for a scheduled departure, which reduces waiting times at busy periods. The line's cost was estimated at about 7 million euros, or 130 million lira at the exchange rate of the day, with a separate budget of about 100 million lira targeted for the recreation area and social facilities on the summit.

An area of 380 dönüms on the summit was to be landscaped. The project included a Ferhat and Şirin presentation area, an access road, kiosks, an amphitheatre, children's playgrounds, a place of worship and arbours, a country restaurant and a country café, scenic viewing terraces, a car park, ornamental pools and pedestrian walkways. With this development the hill would cease to be merely a point one climbs for the view and descends from, becoming a place for rest and excursions where a whole day could be spent. The 2020 report's view of the cable car as a complement to the Ferhat Hill recreation project stems from this same unity: the line would provide access to the summit facilities, and the facilities would supply the line with its passengers.

In a presentation to members of the city council on 27 August 2022, Mehmet Sarı announced that the foundation of the line would soon be laid and that the cable car was scheduled to open on 12 June 2023. His words, "Amasya will become another Amasya once again. We will introduce Amasya both to tourism and to money," summed up the economic expectations placed on the project. The difference between the 380 dönüms mentioned in this announcement and the 250 decares of Treasury land in the 2020 report indicates either that the area to be developed on the summit was enlarged or that parcels under different ownership were taken into account; no official statement has explained the difference separately.

The 2022 Tender and the Operating Model

The tender notice for the project was published in October 2022. The subject of the tender was defined as "the construction of one cable car facility and social facilities and their operation for 29 years". It covered revenue-generating facilities in line with the recreation area regulations in the forest compartments included in the 2021 contract with the General Directorate of Forestry, a cable car facility to be built on an area of 8,594 square metres under a final permit from the Ministry of Agriculture and Forestry, and a car park, day-use and commercial facilities around the lower station. The contractor would build all these facilities, operate them for twenty-nine years including the construction period, and at the end of that term hand them all over to Amasya Municipality. This is a model in which the investment is made with the investor's capital, without spending public funds, and repaid from operating revenues; the twenty-five-year term of the 2018 tender had now been extended to twenty-nine years so as to include the construction period.

The tender was to be held under the sealed-bid procedure of the State Tender Law on Thursday, 27 October 2022, at 10.15 in the municipal council chamber, with bidders required to submit their files by 09.00 the same morning. The outcome of the tender, and whether a contract was signed with a contractor, does not appear in the available sources. Nor has any report been found showing that the opening target of 12 June 2023 was met. At the time of writing, no official announcement has been found that the Amasya cable car has entered service; for now the line remains a project known through its plans, reports and tender documents.

How the Figures Changed

The figures announced at different stages of the project do not agree, and these differences show how the line was redesigned over time. In the 2018 tender the line was given as 1,488 metres, in the 2020 feasibility report as about 1,500 metres, and in the 2022 project as 1,553 metres. These small differences in length most probably relate to the stations' locations and the route being finalised. The fact that the first zoning plan defined the line as running between the castle and Ferhat Mountain, while later documents moved the lower station to the car park on the riverbank, also suggests that the route changed; no document explaining the reason for this change has been found.

The type of system changed as well. Whereas the 2020 report speaks of an arrangement of two large vehicles of sixty passengers each and a capacity of one million passengers a year, the 2022 project envisages a gondola system with twenty-two eight-person cabins carrying a thousand passengers an hour. The operating term was set at twenty-five years in 2018, again at twenty-five years plus a two-year construction period in the 2020 report, and at twenty-nine years including construction in the 2022 tender. The cost estimates were also given in different currencies: 11 million dollars in 2020 and about 7 million euros in 2022. The two figures do not cover the same things; the first refers to the entire line investment including the stations, the second to the cable car cost announced by the municipality, with the summit facilities calculated separately.

The City Seen from Ferhat Hill

All the justifications for the cable car project ultimately rest on a single view. From Ferhat Hill the whole Amasya valley lies open below: the bends of the Yeşilırmak passing through the heart of the city, the timber Yalıboyu houses of the Hatuniye neighbourhood lined up along the river, the tombs of the Pontic kings carved into the slope of Harşena, and the castle walls on the mountain's summit all come together in a single frame. Since the rock tombs face south, the best way to see them head-on and in their full sequence is from the opposite slope. This is why the feasibility report regards the Tombs of the Kings and Ferhat Hill as two complementary stops.

The hill is at its most impressive in the late afternoon and at sunset. The evening sun turns Harşena's limestone cliffs orange and deepens the shadows of the rock tombs. Once the castle and Yalıboyu are illuminated, the city's night view is a sight in its own right; the 2020 report's expectation that evening tourism would revive together with the lighting of the castle rests on this view. As the air on the hill is cooler than in the city, it is wise to bring a cardigan even on summer evenings. For those wishing to photograph the whole valley, a wide-angle lens helps to gather both banks of the river and Harşena into the same frame. Once the cable car is built, the same view will be seen at the end of a journey of nearly five minutes over the valley, together with the journey itself.

Chronology

1960s: According to local accounts, the idea of a cable car is raised by Amasya's mayors from this period onwards.

1 July 2016: Conservation-oriented zoning plans covering the cable car project between Amasya Castle and Ferhat Mountain and the castle tunnel project are approved by the Ministry of Environment and Urbanisation; the plan is put on public display on 29 July 2016.

January 2017: Mayor Cafer Özdemir announces that the Ferhat Tunnel has reached its final stage and that work on the cable car project is continuing.

July 2018: The feasibility contract for the Ferhat Hill Cable Car and Natural Living Area Project is signed between Amasya Municipality and the Central Black Sea Development Agency.

14 August 2018: Announced as the tender date for a 1,488-metre cable car to be operated for twenty-five years and then transferred.

November 2020: The Central Black Sea Development Agency publishes the Amasya Province Cable Car Line Installation Pre-Feasibility Report (about 1,500 metres, 11 million dollars, fourteen-year payback).

18 January 2021: A contract for the right to operate Ferhat Hill as a type B recreation area is signed between the General Directorate of Forestry and Amasya Municipality.

August 2022: The municipality prepares the project site; a 1,553-metre gondola system with twenty-two cabins and a capacity of a thousand passengers an hour is announced.

27 August 2022: Mehmet Sarı presents the project to the city council and gives 12 June 2023 as the target opening date.

27 October 2022: Tender date for the construction of the cable car facility and social facilities and their operation for twenty-nine years.

Bibliography

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