Up, up, and away There are many ways we travel in the United States: bikes, buses, cars, trains, and airplanes, to name a few. But unlike other countries around the world?Bolivia, Hong Kong, and Turkey for example?Americans don?t often use gondolas or tramways as transit, especially in urban areas.
That could change, though, with urban areas in the U.S. considering proposals for gondolas and cable cars to efficiently move people from place to place. The Chicago Skyline project wants to use cable cars to transport tourists along the city?s riverfront, while in Austin the Wire proposal would create an aerial system akin to a "moving sidewalk" that would be much less expensive than a comparable light-rail system.
Trams, gondolas, and funiculars can supplement mass transportation systems and provide innovative solutions in steep, rocky, or densely populated terrain. We?ve rounded up 10 international urban gondolas in a previous article, and now we turn our gaze to a different mode of transit found here in the United States: aerial tramways. Although people frequently use gondolas and trams interchangeably, they are actually different systems. While a gondola uses cabins suspended from a continuously circulating cable?and usually has dozens of cabins?aerial trams use two larger cabins that simply shuttle back and forth on the cables.
Trams in the United States are rare and most often used for sightseeing or to access skiing in states like Alaska, Utah, and Wyomi...