Oregon City Municipal Elevator, Oregon City

The Oregon City Municipal Elevator is a 130ft elevator which connects two neighborhoods in Oregon City in the U.S. state of Oregon. It is the only outdoor municipal elevator in the U.S. and one of only four in the world. The upper portion contains an observation deck which accounts for its flying saucer appearance.
There have been two elevators at this location. The current elevator was built in 1954–55, and it was added to the National Register of Historic Places in 2014.
The city of Oregon City includes dramatic changes in elevation. The city's central business district is sandwiched between the Willamette River and a basalt cliff, and is only several blocks wide. At the top of the 90ft cliff lies another neighborhood. Indian trails negotiating the cliffside were used originally to connect the two areas beginning with the founding of the town in 1829. Numerous stairways were built in the mid-1860s, but a better transportation solution was needed.
A bond measure to raise $12,000 for construction was put to voters in July 1912. This levy failed, but a second referendum passed in December of the same year. The elevator opened to the public in 1915, delayed by politics. The original elevator was water-powered and took three minutes for the ride. The elevator was so popular that most of the cliffside stairs were removed. The elevator was converted to electric drive in 1924, which reduced the time to 30 seconds.