UNIQUE & FUN Otis TOUCH Traction Elevators (TBM) at The Board of Trade Building in Portland, OR

Filmed on December 29th, 2022 with ‎@WestCoastElevators . First of all, I want to wish Kyle aka WestCoast Elevators a VERY Happy Birthday! Me and Kyle have been friends for about 8 years now and have talked to each other for the LONGEST Time and he's become one of my best friends in this community! With that being said however, we've never actually met up.... That is, UNTIL NOW which is when we went on this trip to Seattle and Portland together, and to Celebrate, I felt that it was appropriate that we do so with one of the FUNNEST & COOLEST Elevators we saw on the trip! These elevators are located at the Historic Board of Trade Building on the North End of Downtown Portland, Oregon. Built in 1909, the elevators here were OBVIOUSLY Manually Controlled originally, but in either 1972 or 73 (According to Mitchell aka ‎@OregonTransitFan ), these were completely modernized & fully automated into Otis VIP 260 Elevators with Square Touch/Heat Sensitive buttons! These elevators are REALLY REALLY COOL & REALLY EPIC for SO MANY Reasons! Normally, this is a situation where I would say "the mod is still vintage so who cares!?!?" and that absolutely applies here, but what's especially interesting and cool is that when these elevators were modernized, they kept the original cab layout and configuration the same! 1 of the COPs is home to where the crank would've been, the location of the seemingly very oddly placed doors would've obviously been the gate, and I'd assume the back COP is where the Car Annunciator used to be. The proof that these used to be Manual literally lies all around you and it's definitely not something you see everyday on a fully modernized/automated elevator! That's not the only cool thing about these though! Even though this building is only 11 floors and these elevators only serve 11 floors, they go INSANELY FAST for that height, likely around 600 FPM and they FEEL it!!! They LAUNCH like ROCKETS on Startup, you can feel the floor really push you up inside the cab when the elevators go up and when these stop, they do so smoothly, but in a way you can REALLY feel it which is pretty awesome! Aside from these elevators kind of having a mind of their own at times, they literally run PERFECTLY while also being really THRILLING and a TON of fun at the exact same time! And the Original Square Touch/Heat Sensitive buttons just top these things off in terms of how EPIC they, and they're in pretty good shape and look absolutely beautiful as do the Unique Lanterns, Doors and the Indicators in the Lobby! The only really bad thing I can think of about these elevators is that they're soon going to be former Otis Touch :(. According to signs in the elevator cabs, these elevators are going to be modernized AGAIN and as a result will be history in a matter of just a few months. I really hope whoever modernizes these keeps some of the unique features of these elevators such as the cab configuration and INSANE Speed for their travel distance, but they definitely won't be the same without the Touch buttons and the Epic Relays and Howling Generator sets. With that being said though, if you guys REALLY want to see these elevators, you have a few months left to do so before it's too late! And with that, I hope you guys all enjoy the video of these VERY EPIC, FUN & UNIQUE Elevators that will soon sadly bite the dust, and Happy Birthday ‪@WestCoastElevators‬!!! Installed in 1909. (Manually Controlled Otis Elevators) Modernized in 1972 or 1973. (Otis with Square Touch/Heat Sensitive buttons, New Motors, New Cabs, New Controllers and New Inner doors and New Lanterns. Cab layout and Outer doors left as is.) Cabs redone in Circa 2018-2019. To be Completely Modernized again in 2023. :(