Old Ski Gondolas Find New Life as Private Dining Rooms

冬季寒冷的天气即将到来，不断变化COVID-19限制室内用餐的规则，温迪和丰富的Tucciarone开始担心去年秋天的汽船泉，科罗拉多州，手工艺啤酒厂和餐厅的命运。

In the summer, it was easy to spread out the tables on山水龙头啤酒厂大露台和道具打开了建筑物的车库门。但是，即使有加热器和壁炉，露台在冰冷的傍晚温度和以其“香槟粉”而闻名的科罗拉多滑雪镇的频繁暴风雪中也是一个艰难的卖光。

在一次创意的集思广益会议上，他们的会计师建议将服务外滑雪缆车转换为小型，封闭的，类似立方体的空间，这些空间将滑雪者和滑雪板运送到户外用餐空间。Tucciarones是狂热的滑雪者和山地自行车手，因此他们立即喜欢这个主意。

但是，即使在山区，二手滑雪缆车也很难获得。

Lucky for the Tucciarones and otherstruggling restaurant ownersacross the country, one woman had been buying up entire fleets of used ski gondolas over the last few years, mostly on a whim, in the hopes of someday upcycling them into something else.

The pandemic became that someday. Dominique Bastien ownsThe Gondola Shop这是一家小型吊船翻新和维修店，在科罗拉多州的Fruita，有七名员工，这是冠状病毒大流行期间不太可能的明星。随着夏天的变化，巴斯蒂安（Bastien）和她的团队开始将旧的滑雪缆车变成小说，流行狂欢，私人用餐空间，为恐慌的餐馆老板想知道他们的状况如何在冬天继续营业。

山水龙头啤酒厂installed three of Bastien's gondolas, which can each comfortably seat six adults and are available by reservation, on the patio in November. They've been booked ever since.

"The gondolas have saved us this winter for sure," said Wendy Tucciarone.

Like yurts, greenhouses, tents, igloos, andother pandemic pivots，滑雪缆车允许餐厅扩大座位并提供舒适的户外用餐住宿during the winterwhile adhering to local regulations intended to help prevent the spread of the virus. Each gondola can typically hold between four and six adults who, in theory, are all members of the same household or pandemic pod. Many restaurants are blocking off 20 to 30 minutes between seatings to sanitize, clean, and air out the gondolas, which are often equipped with lights, heaters, and Bluetooth speakers.

Bastien贡多拉商店剥离的常规trade, which is polishing and repainting ski gondolas that are still in use at ski resorts around the globe. (Gondola windows and doors are typically plexiglass, which gets scratched, graffitied, dirty, and cloudy over time—Bastien says she runs the only company in the world,阳光抛光技术，这与滑雪措施合同以抛光其在职吊船。）

巴斯蒂安（Bastien）的吊船维护工作通常在一月和2月放慢脚步，当时滑雪胜地在全力以赴。因此，三年前，当她听说佛蒙特州的基灵顿度假村（Killington Resort）取代了55辆较大的吊船汽车时，她承担了巨大的风险，并提出要购买全部。

一年后，她从附近的汽船度假村购买了95辆缆车。

巴斯蒂安说：“我不知道我想到了什么。”“我真的没有想到。”

巴斯蒂安（Bastien）在吊船抛光业务的20多年中，偶尔听到了一次性的房主听到的，他们希望为他们的后院或活动筹划者进行翻新的吊船，他们希望吊船能够帮助建立Après-Ski Spice。她认为对重新利用的吊船的需求可能更大，她和她的员工可以在他们的下降月份进行。他们试验将它们转换为桑拿浴室和狗屋，但大多数情况下，150辆左右的吊船汽车坐在她商店附近的田野中。

Then, the pandemic hit. In the blink of an eye, Bastien lost all of her gondola polishing contracts as ski resorts closed early for the season in March.

她说：“我慢慢打算破产，没有开玩笑。”

In September, Bastien's phone rang. The Town of Mountain Village near Telluride, Colorado, wanted Bastien to repurpose five gondola cars into private dining spaces that could be shared among the 12 restaurants at the base of Telluride Ski Resort. Within two weeks, they upped their order to 25.

巴斯蒂安（Bastien）和她的团队开始工作，在四个月内疯狂地解决了一年的工作。他们学习了，有时将其庞大的滑雪区提升维护技术人员称为问题和故障排除。

The Gondola Shop delivered on its promise, and the Town of Mountain Village opened 25 private dining cars ahead of the Christmas rush. The picturesque gondolas quickly garnered attention on social media and in the press—and then Bastien's phone and email really began to blow up.

Suddenly, she was fielding inquiries from restaurants in Cleveland, Washington, D.C., St. Louis, San Francisco, Park City, Utah, and Sun Valley, Idaho. Her team, which includes a painter, welder, woodworker, and several other artisans, began churning out customized dining gondolas as quickly as possible.

Bastien offers gondolas in various conditions. Some restaurants buy them as-is for around $4,800 and just stick a table inside. (Bastien doesn't recommend this practice but is happy to accommodate. "It smells like 30 years of use when you open the door," she said.)

对于其他人来说，巴斯蒂安（Bastien）的团队将完全拆卸，清洁，沙蓝色，修复，重新粉刷，重新塑料，并通常将吊船涂到餐厅的规格上，该过程需要五到六周，费用在15,000美元至20,000美元之间。她还以每月约500美元的价格租用了全面翻新的吊船餐车。

尽管过去六个月一直是混乱的，但巴斯蒂安说，她很高兴忙于做一些重要的事情 - 最终可能会帮助一些餐馆继续营业。

"It just got crazy," she said. "Things turned out really weirdly but really well."

Just outside of Cleveland, five après-ski-themed gondola cars are helping restaurateur John Owen keep the lights on at落基河酒吧vwin德赢ac米兰和市场，他在该地区拥有的七家餐厅中的两家。

欧文在两家餐馆的户外用餐空间进行了大量投资，以保持员工的工作和安全（服务器通过吊船的敞开窗户通过食物和饮料），但他认为，在可预见的未来，许多人会在室内不舒服。vwin德赢ac米兰他还将吊船视为公共关系和市场营销的投资 - 他们在Tiktok和Instagram上很受欢迎。

他说：“这使我们能够保持相关和忙碌，足以允许我们所有的员工保持雇用而不会失去轮班 - 因为当您失去座位（餐厅）时，您必须失去员工。”

Restaurant owner George Eder is counting on a surge of pent-up demand this spring and summer, and he believes the two gondolas he rented from Bastien will help his restaurant Pizza Republica get by until then. But more than anything, they offer a tiny glimmer of what dining out used to feel like, before the pandemic.

他说：“看到人们的脸很有趣。”“如果有人取消，那就是'哦，我可以得到一个吊船。'他们感到兴奋。这就是餐馆现在缺少的东西，这是一点点的喜悦。”