Every Tuesday, we pick our favorite Instagram photos from around the lift world.
Mexicable
Instagram Tuesday: Steel
Every Tuesday, we pick our favorite Instagram photos from around the lift world.
News Roundup: The People
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b_I64lxkCTQ&feature=youtu.be
- Packsaddle II at Keystone gets the first Skytrac tension-return station based on the Monarch terminal.
- Searchmont’s 1989 Doppelmayr quad chair will spin this season for the first time in six years. The mountain’s nonprofit owner could not afford to address two service bulletins until now.
- See how urban gondolas are evacuated if the need arises.
- Paris’ first urban gondola will be bigger than London’s.
- With orders from Sandia Peak, the Oakland Zoo and Jackson Hole, CWA has now supplied 2,000 cabins in the United States.
- Fernie flies a winter’s worth of diesel fuel – 5,300 gallons – to the Polar Peak triple by helicopter.
- See tons more photos of LST’s first detachable here.
- 42,584 passengers ride Mexicable in its first two days of operation.
- The Navajo Nation Law and Order Committee votes 5-0 to oppose the Grand Canyon Escalade.
- NewEnglandSkiIndustry.com has the latest on all four of New England’s new lifts.
- The new Doppelmayr DCD Chair will debut in Hochzillertal on one of five D-Line installations to be operating in Austria by the end of the year.
- Winch cables and chairs apparently don’t mix well.
- Doppelmayr posts a video tour of the proposed Wälderbahn next-generation 3S with sections of elevated guideways in place of cables.
- Montana Snowbowl throws in the towel on TV Mountain until next spring.
- Echo Mountain sale closes and the mountain will open in December.
Instagram Tuesday: Flying
Every Tuesday, we pick our favorite Instagram photos from around the lift world.
https://www.instagram.com/p/BLJMo5BhtJP/?tagged=liftmaintenance
News Roundup: Happenings
- Mexican President Enrique Peña Nieto inaugurates Mexicable today with free rides all week and an impressive span of service: 4:30 am to 11:00 pm. Mexicable also features the first Leitner DirectDrives in North America.
- Doppelmayr looks at building a gondola network in Port-au-Prince, Haiti financed by China.
- Three public agencies agree to fund $15,000 preliminary study of Austin’s Wire idea with results to be released in nine weeks. Hint: 19 stations is way too many.
- El Paso’s Wyler Aerial Tramway, built in 1959, breaks down.
- Doppelmayr showcases its Koblenz urban 3S at Innotrans in Berlin. Leitner was there too.
- Sunday River sells chairs from South Ridge, Suicide Six sells more from its old double.
- Pebble Creek’s new owner has 4.8 million followers on YouTube.
- Fatzer and Doppelmayr splice the record-breaking Giggijochbahn and the stats are impressive: 4,500 pph, 134 cabins, 6.5 m/s, 62 mm rope.
- The most expensive lift ever built opens Oct. 22nd at Stubaier Glacier.
- America needs an urban gondola done right, Mike Deiparine of Engineering Specialties Group tells Wired.
- First cabin takes a trip on the Blue line, La Paz’s 5th urban gondola.
Mexico’s Big Urban Gondola to Open in October
Commuters in a Mexico City suburb will take their first flights on a two-stage, $26 million gondola system called Mexicable in a few short weeks on Monday, October 3rd. State of Mexico Governor Eruvio Ávila announced the city of Ecatepec will join the growing list of cities in the Americas building ropeways over congested neighborhoods. The Governor’s Facebook Live test run video has been watched more than 461,000 times. Mexico joins Brazil, Bolivia, Colombia, the Dominican Republic, Ecuador, Peru and Venezuela that operate (or will soon open) gondolas for urban commuters.
In Ecatepec, two loops will combine to serve seven stations and up to 3,000 passengers per hour in each direction. The State of Mexico and its private operators Grupo IUSA and ALFA Group awarded Leitner Ropeways a contract to build the two gondolas in January 2014 and construction began later that year. The lifts were largely completed in 2015 but station build-out and testing took longer than expected and the opening comes a few months late.
The new lifts will transit three miles over 32 towers in 17 minutes, replacing a bus line that takes 45 minutes. 185 10-passenger Sigma Diamond cabins painted in Mexico’s national colors will move up to 26,000 commuters each weekday. Line speed is 5 m/s and the span of service will be 17 hours per day. A ticket will cost eight pesos (43 cents) and the line will complement the Mexibus line 4, a 20-mile Bus Rapid Transit (BRT) line currently under construction.
Instagram Tuesday: Abroad
Every Tuesday, we pick our favorite Instagram photos from around the lift world.
News Roundup: Ski Train
- Nelson, BC moves forward with Fringed Hill Gondola project.
- Leaders look at building a four stage gondola between famous tourist sites in Jerusalem.
- Amtrak’s Winter Park Express train returns January 2017 after a seven-year hiatus. A new platform alongside the Union Pacific Railway’s main line will be just 90 feet from the Gemini Express.
- Poma and Sigma are building a triangle-shaped gondola at a wildlife park in China with 224 cabins. They will come in four different animal designs and 70 will feature glass floors. The innovative lift will debut in January.
- Leitner Ropeways will attend the global transportation technology summit Innotrans in Berlin.
- The first cabin takes a spin on the White Line in La Paz. The White and Blue lines will open in 2017 joining the Red, Yellow and Green lines and the world’s largest gondola network.
- Mi Teleférico also opens two retail stores dedicated to gondola souvenirs and public outreach. Does your local public transit authority have 200,000 Facebook fans?
- Cloudchaser takes flight at Mt. Bachelor.
- A progress report from Arizona Snowbowl where Leitner-Poma is building the state’s first six-pack.
- The State Fair Flyer at the North Carolina State Fair is a brand new Partek.
- Mexicable opens October 3rd in Ecatepec, Mexico. The Leitner-built system has two haul ropes, seven stations and 190 cabins. The local Governor took a test run earlier this week and the video has been viewed more than 430,000 times.
- An empty chair falls from the Gunbarrel Express at Thredbo, Australia during public operation. The lift is a 1988 Doppelmayr with DS grips.
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