What's in a Name?

A Lift by any other name ...

Inclined Elevators are known by many names including cable cars, funiculars, hillside elevators, hillside lifts, tramways, people movers, chair lifts and, when specifically built for people with physical disabilities, as accessibility systems. Waterfront property owners might call them lakeshore lifts, high bank lifts or waterfront elevators.

The wide variety of names is indicative of the many ways in which people have found them useful for moving goods and people up and down hills.

Funimag is a website devoted to the inclined elevator.
 

A Brief History of Inclined Elevators

Staircases and later elevators were originally developed to overcome the difficulties of changing levels as comfortably as possible. Inclined railways were popular from the last quarter of the 19th century into the 1930s. Otis built an incline railway in the curved legs of the Eiffel Tower in Paris to carry passengers and freight, installed an inclined catwalk in the Goodyear Zeppelin Plant in Akron, Ohio, in 1930 and built an incline elevator at the Thornhill Golf Course in Toronto in 1933.

Funicular Facts
 
Steepest:
The world's steepest passenger railway is the Katoomba Scenic Railway, a funicular down the wall of the Jamison Valley near Katoomba, New South Wales, Australia. It has a maximum grade of 122° (which is 32° beyond the horizontal). 
 
Oldest:
The oldest railway in the world is a funicular or inclined elevator! It was built circa 1500 in Salzburg (Mozart's city) to carry people between the town and the fortress and is still in use today!  Click here for more information
 
Longest:
On December 16th 1997 the two sections of the Sierre-Montana-Crans funicular were joined into a single section, making it the world’s longest funicular at 4192 meters (or just over 2.6 miles). It links the city of Sierre, in the Rhône valley, to the Crans-Montana-Vermala resort in a 12 minute ride. Click here for more information
 
Other:
The Great Incline of the Mount Lowe Railway had multiple grades with cars that adjust to the variations. The gentlest grade is 48° and the steepest is 62°.