Editing Cable transport (section)

=== Early aerial tramways ===
[[File:MayflowerTramwayBucket.jpg|thumb|right|An aerial tramway used in mining, at the [[Shenandoah-Dives Mill]] in [[Silverton, Colorado]]]]

The first recorded mechanical ropeway was by Venetian [[Fausto Veranzio]] who designed a bi-cable passenger ropeway in 1616. The industry generally considers Dutchman [[Adam Wybe]] to have built the first operational system in 1644. The technology, which was further developed by the people living in the Alpine regions of Europe, progressed and expanded with the advent of wire rope and electric drive.<ref name=csm />

The first use of [[wire rope]] for aerial tramways is disputed. American inventor [[Peter Cooper]] is one early claimant, constructing an aerial tramway using wire rope in [[Baltimore]] 1832, to move [[landfill]] materials. Though there is only partial evidence for the claimed 1832 tramway, Cooper was involved in many of such tramways built in the 1850s, and in 1853 he built a two-mile-long tramway to transport [[iron ore]] to his [[blast furnace]]s at [[Ringwood, New Jersey]].<ref name=highwire>{{cite book |title=Riding the Hire Wire |last=Trennert |first=Robert A. |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=5sW9AwAAQBAJ |date=2001 |publisher=University Press of Colorado|isbn=9781457109850 }}</ref>

World War I motivated extensive use of [[Military cableways in the First World War|military tramways]] for warfare between Italy and Austria.<ref name="csm">{{cite web |url=http://www.mines.edu/library/ropeway/about_ropeways.html |title=About Ropeways |publisher=Colorado School of Mines – Arthur Lakes Library |author=Information Center for Ropeway Studies |date=2006-03-17 |access-date=2006-11-30 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20060904183704/http://www.mines.edu/library/ropeway/about_ropeways.html |archive-date=2006-09-04}}</ref>

During the industrial revolution, new forms of cable-hauled transportation systems were created including the use of steel cable to allow for greater load support and larger systems. [[Aerial tramway]]s were first used for commercial passenger haulage in the 1900s.<ref name=hoffman />