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Seattle’s Space Needle now has a double-decker all-glass elevator

The Space Needle’s new all-glass, double-deck outdoor elevator is seen on the move Thursday before opening to the public Friday. This first replacement elevator is on the north side of the Needle and will open to passengers on two floors at once. (Ken Lambert/Seattle Times)
The Space Needle’s new all-glass, double-deck outdoor elevator is seen on the move Thursday before opening to the public Friday. This first replacement elevator is on the north side of the Needle and will open to passengers on two floors at once. (Ken Lambert/Seattle Times)
By Kai Uyehara Seattle Times

SEATTLE – There’s always one person who’s afraid of heights in a group ascending the 605-foot Space Needle.

They’ll stand with their back to the brushed stainless steel wall on the inside of the elevator, with their dauntless kids standing between them and the broadening eagle-eye view of Seattle and the Puget Sound.

If that person is you, get ready to hold someone’s hand to anchor yourself, because the experience is about to get a little more … thrilling.

Space Needle visitors will have the chance to ride in the landmark’s first new all-glass, double-decker elevator, which started Friday. The “Skyliner” elevator’s grand opening marks the beginning of the last phase of a $100 million renovation project that will make the Seattle landmark go “glass ga-ga,” as a Space Needle spokesperson once put it, just like the architects always intended.

The Skyliner facing the Queen Anne neighborhood is the first of three elevators to be installed in the Space Needle by 2028, replacing the old gold cabs, said Genny Boots, Space Needle spokesperson. The next elevator is to arrive in two years, followed by the third and final a year later. It’s the first elevator of its kind in North America.

The Skyliner sports 200% more glass than its predecessor, with floor-to-ceiling glass that wraps around both sides of the cab, said Karen Olson, chief operating officer at the Space Needle.

On one side, you can look over Queen Anne rising above the curvaceous Museum of Pop Culture and the International Fountain. On the inside, you can see the hoist cable, guide rails, magnets and the counterweights whizzing by the structure’s skeleton and winding double helix staircase.

Otis Worldwide, the elevator and escalator manufacturer, assembled the car frame and “the Machine” in Tianjin, China. The car frame was then reassembled with the cab at a warehouse in Ballard. The vaguely named contraption, which is the size of a cargo van and weighs as much as a fully stacked fire engine, pulls the elevator up the side of the tower, Olson said.

The only “Machines” similar to the three that will be installed in the Space Needle are used in the Burj Khalifa, the world’s tallest tower, Olson said.

At the top, visitors can see the newest feats of the modernization project that began in 2017.

Families giggle as they step onto the rotating glass floor and ooh and aah in the upper observation deck, peering through 48 glass panels that lean 12 degrees over the edge of the instantly recognizable flying saucer. Glass benches set against the glass are purposefully positioned so that even adults’ legs dangle as they lean backward over the edge.

Following a ribbon-cutting ceremony, visitors started riding the new glass elevator at 8 a.m. Friday. The forecast called for mostly sunny skies, so it was likely a great day to look over the city.

General admission tickets to the top of the tower cost $35 to $45 for adults, with discounts for kids and seniors. Appointments are timed in 15-minute increments from 8 a.m. to 11 p.m. on Friday to Monday, and 9 a.m. to 10 p.m. on Tuesday through Thursday.