Usually, the only time skiers or snowboarders notice the lifts in a mountain resort is when one of them doesn’t work. Otherwise, we take them for granted.

Generally the only time snowboarders or skiers become aware of the lifts in a mountain resort are when one of the ski lifts is out of action and they can’t get back up the mountain.

However on the new Peak 2 Peak gondola which recently opened in the Canadian ski resort of Whistler this is defiantly not the case.  Whistler is about a hour drive from Vancouver as now has an attraction that is as exciting as riding the mountain itself.

The resorts new ski lift links 2 separate mountains together, the 7,160ft Whistler and 8,000ft Blackcomb – and at one point they are a massive 2.7 miles apart.

The major obstacle of this ski lift was the cabling issues as to reach far enough they had to be strung across a central, unsupported span that is nearly two miles wide.  The gondolas carry up to 28 people and hang a very scary 1,427ft above the pine forests below.

At a cost of 28million the park is making sure that new visitors as well as regular ones are able to make full use of the mountains as quickly and hassle free as possible.

Finally on Febuary 14th the wait to see the longest cable car to cross the sea in the world will be over when the 3.310.06 meter long Nhat Trang to Vinpearl cable car starts it first run.  There will be 100 hours of testing time made to the attraction to assure the safety before its starts to carry passengers.

During the tests all 47 cabins will carry 1 ton of sand (the equivalent of 8 passengers) and after the cars have been tested and deemed a success passengers will be able to ride the attraction.  

Locals are excited by the prospect of the cable car as it will allow people from Vinpearl to reach Nhat Trang in as little as 9 minutes travel.

How about this for a big crane, this is the Platform Twinring the world’s largest mobile crane and there are three altogether in the fleet.  The cranes are known as PTC’s (Platform Twinring Containerised) and can be used as 20ft or 40ft cranes.

Every part of the crane can be hoisted with a normal container crane onto any dock anywhere in the world.   Their fittings are molded into the ends so they are able to go onto any truck or trailer that handles shipping containers.  These cranes are the giants of the mobile crane world.

Some people think there is a funny similarity between elevators and caves and they have similar affects on people in different ways. While many people are absoluly fine in an elevator others cannot stand to be in either a cave or an elevator.  We also associate elevators and lifts with sexual fantasies some people have even acted them out for real making an elevator a very safe place to be.

Let’s take a look at top 10 elevators in the world!

1.Taipei 101 is one of the world’s tallest building. It hosts 67 elevators in all, and several can reach the speed of 3300 feet per minute! This is officially the world’s fastest elevator.

2. Lisburn, Portugal has an elevator is called Santa Justa Lift, a landmark of Lisbon. It is more than 100 years old, and an important contribution to the history of this lift!

3.The Gateway Arch in St. Louis, Missouri (United States) is must see, even it is not like any elevator you used before.  It carries up to 5 passengers in an egg shaped cabin and eight cabins are connected together similar to a train.  The cabins rotate 5 degrees per second allowing wonderful views.

4.Located in the Switzerland is the Hammetschwand Europe’s highest exterior elevator.  The elevator is used to tale visitors to a spectacular rock path with a lookout on the Burgenstock plateau overlooking Lake Lucerne.  It takes passengers up over 150 meters to the top in less than 1 minute.

5.The Lacerda Elevator in Brazil is 72 meters in height and connects the old and the new part of Salvador, and allows access to ore than 30,000 people per days costing just $0.05 per go.

6.The Bailong Elevator China. The 326 meter high elevator takes you up one of the massive cliffs in Zhangjiajie in China. It is said to be the highest and heaviest outdoor elevator in the world.  The future of this fantastic elevator is under threat for environmental reasons.

7.Sometimes staying with hydraulic lift technology is superior, and this lift confirms it. At the push of a button, the elevator inside the Louvre, Paris, rises and then a slide-out walkway emerges once the circular platform comes to a rest for passengers to board/disembark.

8.Because of the Eiffel Tower’s curved shaped legs installing an elevator onto the structure was seen as an engineering nightmare. Today there are 2 lift elevator running up and down each of the four legs, one being used purely for restaurant customers.

9.The Inclinator elevator at the Luxor Hotel in Las Vegas, Nevada travels up the side of the pyramid structured hotel. An Inclinator is basically a stair lift which was developed by the Inclinator Company of America.

10.This elevator in Oregan City, Oregan connects two areas in Oregon City. Before the lift was built in 1915 people used stairways built into the cliffs to travel between the two areas. The observation deck at the top lets viewers see views of Willamette Falls, and the Oregon City Bridge.

What makes elevator advertising so great is that anyone who walks into the elevator is forced to look at the commercial at some point. You crammed into a tiny space with several other people for at least 30 seconds it’s great to have something there to take your mind off feeling like a sardine.

Image from thecoolhunter.co.uk

Marketers and advertisers have used this in some brilliant and diverse ways from using the space to create an apartment or club setting to creating optical illusions with stickers.  Take a look at the examples above and below. 

People who are afraid of heights may get a shock when entering the elevator above, which seems to reveal a view of the city below.  This image’s is created by a large sticker fixed to the floor, very clever.   The ad was used by a Swiss skydiving school to give people an idea of what it’s like jumping from a plane.

For year’s space exploration follower s have anticipated building an elevator into low earth orbit using only a cable stretching from the surface of the earth way into space. Huge obstacles have stopped this from actually happening. But as technology moves on, some researchers have been making progress.

The project is funded by NASA along with the Space Forward Foundation and their annual contest offers the winner a $2 million first prize to the first group who can get the machine to send a kilometer-long ribbon tethered to a helicopter, while receiving power remotely from the ground. No team has ever won the first prize but LaserMotive did however qualify for the $900,000 second prize.

Take a look at this great way to advertise using elevator doors. The traditional shirt opening on Superman was dramatized with the use of a panoramic elevator in a shopping mall.

This attention-grabbing use of new media gave us one more way to show that just about anything can be used to advertise with.