Controversial Cortina cable car still unfinished a week before Winter Games start

MILAN, Jan 30 : Mounting doubts surround whether Cortina's cable car will be ready in time for the women's Olympic alpine skiing events at the Dolomites resort, with the infrastructure still unfinished a week before the Games begin.

The Apollonio-Socrepes gondola is one of the most controversial infrastructure projects for the upcoming Winter Olympics, which Cortina and the city of Milan co-host from February 6-22.

Work to build the cable car, designed to take visitors from the town centre directly to the slopes, began behind schedule, and some residents have raised safety concerns about the project, which is being constructed in a landslide area.

But the 50 cabins have not yet been installed and the safety test - originally scheduled for the final week before the start of the Games - still needs to be carried out, two people close to the matter said.

Simico, the state-backed agency in charge of the project, had repeatedly said the cable car would be delivered on time.

In a statement on Friday, it said work was progressing according to schedule.

"The pulling of the cable has been completed and the splicing of the cable will begin as early as Saturday," the agency said, adding that over the weekend the alignment of the rollers at the three stations and the ten pylons will be checked.

Mechanical and hydraulic works were expected to be completed early next week, after which the required technical safety inspections would begin. Once those are finished, the lift would be ready, Simico added.

The Tofane Alpine Skiing Centre in Cortina will host the women's races, with the first scheduled for February 9.

"If it isn't ready by then, the opening (of the cable car) will be postponed by a few days," one of the people involved told