Safety of cable installations

Although Belgium is not a mountainous country, it does have installations similar to those found in mountains: cable cars, ski lifts and other funiculars. These installations serve some well-known tourist sites and are therefore very popular.

Laws and regulations

Obligations for the main contractor (or their representative)

Obligations for the manufacturer of a subsystem

Obligations for the manufacturer of a safety component

Laws and regulations

The general safety requirements are governed by the law of 9 February 1994 on the safety of products and services. The Royal Decree of 23 January 2003 on cableway installations designed to carry persons sets forth more specific requirements regarding the safety of cableway installations designed to carry persons.

Obligations for the main contractor (or their representative)

The main contractor submits their installation design for authorisation to the minister responsible for protecting consumer safety.

They submit their installation design to safety analysis which takes into account all safety aspects of the system and its environment regarding its design, implementation and entry into service and which identifies, on the basis of experience, any risks that may emerge during operation.

This request must be accompanied by a file containing the following:

• the exact contact details of the ‘main contractor’ and/or their representative;
• the scope of use;
• the installation’s identification;
• a report on the safety assessment indicating the proposed measures for addressing risk;
• the certificates of conformity;
• lists of basic components;
• assembly, maintenance and adjustment instructions;
• where appropriate, the ‘EC’ declarations of conformity and related technical documents of the safety components.

The main contractor must keep a copy at the site of the installation.

Obligations for the manufacturer of a subsystem

At the request of the manufacturer, their Community representative or, alternatively, the person or organisation placing the sub-system on the market, a Notified Body verifies and confirms that the subsystem complies with the decree, according to the technical documentation. This procedure is called ‘EC type examination’.

Obligations for the manufacturer of a safety component

For its product to comply with the provisions of the Royal Decree, the manufacturer of the safety component submits that safety component to one of the following conformity evaluation procedures of a Notified Body:

• an EC type examination and application of a production quality assurance system;
• an EC type examination and product verification;
• application of a comprehensive quality assurance system;
• unit verification;