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Peak 2 Peak

I’m in transit to Vancouver today to tour the Peak 2 Peak gondola in Whistler, British Columbia.

The Peak 2 Peak uses an advanced 3S technology, whereby vehicles are supported by two stationary cable spans while the third cable provides the propulsion. It’s one of the most sophisticated cable technologies there is. It enables vehicles to operate safely in 100 km/hr winds and incredibly long unsupported spans. The Peak 2 Peak is one of only a handful of 3S systems in the world, but is notable because it has the single longest unsupported cable span on earth; over 3,024 metres long!

This system operates at 27 km/hr, provides an offered capacity of 2,050 pphpd, and has wait times of 49 seconds between vehicles. Built at a cost of $52 million, it is 4.4 km long and has a per kilometre cost of less than $12 million. The ratio between sitting passenger spaces (sittees) and standing passenger spaces (standees) is more than 3 to 1, which is high for any transit technology.

I’ll let you know more about it in the coming week.

Creative Commons image by Duncan Rawlinson.