Grouse Mountain Resort has installed a new pair of Red Skyride tram cabins at its base terminal on the North Shore after the original cabins served for 50 years.
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Grouse Mountain Resort has replaced the original pair of Red Skyride tram cabins for the first time in 50 years, with on-site installation work carried out at the base terminal at the parking lot last week.
The resort says the replacement introduces two brand-new aerial tram cabins designed to meet modern cabin standards, while also expanding panoramic viewing areas. Both cabins feature larger windows intended to provide wider views of Vancouver, the ocean and surrounding mountains, along with fold-out seating designed to improve comfort and accessibility during the journey.
The new cabins were built by CWA, a Swiss gondola manufacturer and affiliate of the Doppelmayr Group. The company also manufactured the original Red Skyride cabins.
Grouse Mountain says the new cabins will accommodate slightly fewer riders than before, with each cabin holding up to 95 guests compared with the original cabins’ capacity of 100 passengers per vehicle.
The Red Skyride first opened in 1976, and the resort says this is the first full cabin replacement since then. Grouse Mountain president Nick Dean said the new cabins arrive as the resort celebrates its centennial and will help carry guests into the next 100 years.
The resort has not announced a precise reopening date for the Red Skyride with its new cabins, and says it will share that timing shortly. The work is also being completed ahead of the expected start of the winter ski season, which typically begins in early December each year, depending on snowfall levels.
For decades, the Red Skyride and its original cabins were the primary way for visitors to travel up and down the mountain, and the resort says the trams became a defining symbol featured in its marketing and in visitor photos. The resort also notes that for one season of Amazing Race Australia, competitors rode on the roof of the cabin during a high-altitude challenge, leading to the Skyride Surf Adventure that allows guests to stand on an open-air rooftop platform during ascent. It adds that during the Olympic Torch Relay for Vancouver 2010, an Olympic torchbearer rode on a cabin rooftop to reach the top of the mountain.
Grouse Mountain says it plans to creatively repurpose the original cabins, but it has not released details on how they will be used. The Red Skyride reinvestment also comes shortly after the December 2024 opening of the resort’s Blue Grouse Gondola, which features 27 enclosed gondola cars and a capacity of 1,000 passengers per hour, with each car holding up to eight passengers. The resort says Blue Grouse Gondola replaced the previous 1966-built Blue Skyride, which it decommissioned, along with its two aerial tram cabins retained for potential reuse.
Other recent investments at the resort include a mountain bike park that opened last year and a gravity-fed coaster attraction that opened in May 2026. The resort says the gravity coaster has a track length of 1,434 metres (4,700 ft.) with a downhill descent of 919 metres (3,015 ft.) and a vertical drop of 91 metres (298.5 ft.).
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