Doppelmayr and Tremblant partnered to built a third gondola in 2008 that connects two base areas and services a new casino.As of 2019, the Casino Express only operates on weekends.Tower 1.The second station at Soleil.The lift line rises out of each terminal and is flat in the middle.Tower 15.Loading area at Soleil.A small maintenance area.Parking rail.This is one of only two lifts in North America built with CWA Ethos cabins.A tall tower 5.Combination assemblies on tower 3 above the main village.View up the village side of the lift.Lower lift line on the village side.Close up of a cabin on the line.Tower 7.T9 built on bedrock.View toward Soleil at tower 10.Side view of the Soleil station with the new Hymne des Trembles lift behind.Lift line seen from the Cabriolet.
This lift has a feature called “Comfort Mode” where the cabins stop completely for loading and unloading, but the lift stays moving. You can see it in my recording. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AFpz9ABWBME&t=226s
Also, this lift can only operate at 4 m/s due to the very short terminals (same as Sweetwater and Mt Rainier). During my recording the speed is about 3.1 m/s.
This gondola has a ridiculous schedule. It is only open for small windows of time during the evening (prime casino time) on only a handful of days. It should really be open from ~7 pm to casino close every day of the week at least in the winter. It is very frustrating to wait for the shuttle, especially when there is a gondola sitting right there. I have also seen countless people walk up to the gondola to head to the casino, see it not running, and turn around and head back into the village.
I’m not really sure why the schedule is the way it is. I think the shuttle makes more sense a lot of the time since it can pick up in more places than the gondola. When the hotel is built on the Soleil side, the lift will operate more.
The schedule is designed for skiers, not for pedestrians and casino goers. However, this lift is pretty pointless for skiers, as it was built as a transport lift between the main village and the (incomplete) Soleil village, so it does not need to run very often.
Once the restrictions are lifted, Tremblant should experiment with running this lift and the Cabriolet until 9 or 10. The village has enough traffic after skiing where they could be used, and management should really take a trip out to Telluride to see how gondolas can serve dual purposes for both skiers and pedestrians.
Currently the Casino Express is run during skiing hours on weekends and some weekdays, but its schedule has historically been very inconsistent. Nearer to when it was built and the casino opened (2008), it ran evenings during the high season in order to provide transport to the casino as opposed to the soleil side for skiers. That scheme did not last for too long, probably because it wasn’t generating enough traffic for the casino to justify its operation (now we have a shuttle bus). For some time in the middle of the prior decade, it didn’t even run on many weekends.
If I’m to be honest, the village is quite small. The cabriolet crosses it, true, in under 3 minutes, but even by foot it only takes 10-15 minutes. From a business perspective, it might even be smarter not to run the Cabriolet when the only need for it is village foot traffic (and not skiers/snowboarders with gear in hand). Many shops are along the way from the parking lot to the top of the village where the upper station of the Cabriolet is. Not running it could mean more exposure for those shops, and probably more consumer expenditure.
Those are weather/storm doors, they block the weather from making it into the terminal and icing everything over and helps trap heat overnight. They’re quite handy, we have them on our new high speed.
It is not a mountain access lift, it is meant to connect the base with the casino, that’s why it runs slower than a normal gondola. Low operation frequency is probably due to the fact that it runs on the same hours that the casino does.
Lift Blog 
Which is the other built with CWA Ethos cabins?
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Texas Skyway near Dallas. On my list of places to visit one of these years.
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This lift has a feature called “Comfort Mode” where the cabins stop completely for loading and unloading, but the lift stays moving. You can see it in my recording. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AFpz9ABWBME&t=226s
Also, this lift can only operate at 4 m/s due to the very short terminals (same as Sweetwater and Mt Rainier). During my recording the speed is about 3.1 m/s.
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Similar to the clutch system on Glacier at Lake Louise.
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This gondola has a ridiculous schedule. It is only open for small windows of time during the evening (prime casino time) on only a handful of days. It should really be open from ~7 pm to casino close every day of the week at least in the winter. It is very frustrating to wait for the shuttle, especially when there is a gondola sitting right there. I have also seen countless people walk up to the gondola to head to the casino, see it not running, and turn around and head back into the village.
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I’m not really sure why the schedule is the way it is. I think the shuttle makes more sense a lot of the time since it can pick up in more places than the gondola. When the hotel is built on the Soleil side, the lift will operate more.
LikeLike
The schedule is designed for skiers, not for pedestrians and casino goers. However, this lift is pretty pointless for skiers, as it was built as a transport lift between the main village and the (incomplete) Soleil village, so it does not need to run very often.
Once the restrictions are lifted, Tremblant should experiment with running this lift and the Cabriolet until 9 or 10. The village has enough traffic after skiing where they could be used, and management should really take a trip out to Telluride to see how gondolas can serve dual purposes for both skiers and pedestrians.
LikeLike
Currently the Casino Express is run during skiing hours on weekends and some weekdays, but its schedule has historically been very inconsistent. Nearer to when it was built and the casino opened (2008), it ran evenings during the high season in order to provide transport to the casino as opposed to the soleil side for skiers. That scheme did not last for too long, probably because it wasn’t generating enough traffic for the casino to justify its operation (now we have a shuttle bus). For some time in the middle of the prior decade, it didn’t even run on many weekends.
If I’m to be honest, the village is quite small. The cabriolet crosses it, true, in under 3 minutes, but even by foot it only takes 10-15 minutes. From a business perspective, it might even be smarter not to run the Cabriolet when the only need for it is village foot traffic (and not skiers/snowboarders with gear in hand). Many shops are along the way from the parking lot to the top of the village where the upper station of the Cabriolet is. Not running it could mean more exposure for those shops, and probably more consumer expenditure.
But yes, it’s certainly inconvenient.
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The Ethos cabins remind me of Sigma diamond cabins without the bulge in the middle.
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whats the red thing that is blocking the entryway for grips called
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Those are weather/storm doors, they block the weather from making it into the terminal and icing everything over and helps trap heat overnight. They’re quite handy, we have them on our new high speed.
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I love those cabins.
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Me and my dad went on this lift during the Christmas holidays. It’s the slowest gondola I’ve ever been on. Any reason why it doesn’t run as frequent?
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It is not a mountain access lift, it is meant to connect the base with the casino, that’s why it runs slower than a normal gondola. Low operation frequency is probably due to the fact that it runs on the same hours that the casino does.
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Also, the terminals are pretty short, so that also contributes to the slow speed of the gondola.
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