Phil Castle, The Business Times

Leitner-Poma continues to manufacture the chair lifts and gondolas for which the Grand Junction company has long been known.

But speciality and public transportation projects have helped drive business, too, including the completion earlier this year of the world’s largest observation wheel in Las Vegas.

The combination of traditional and not-so-traditional projects has Jon Mauch, sales manager at Leitner-Poma, optimistic about the future.

“There’s a lot of activity. I feel very positive about our company and our business,” Mauch said.

About 120 people work for Leitner-Poma at 90,000 square foot manufacturing facility located on 18 acres. The facility combines in one location Leitner-Poma as well as Prinoth, a snow grooming equipment manufacturer.

Mauch said it’s been a “fairly decent year” for sales of ski lifts, although sales to ski resorts overall have slowed. When resorts do replace lifts, though, they tend to do so with larger, six-passenger chair lifts or gondolas, he said.

Meanwhile Leitner-Poma has been involved in a number of other projects outside the skin industry, Mauch said.

The company manufactured 28 spherical cabins for the High Roller observation wheel in Las Vegas. Each cabin is 22 feet in diameter, weighs 25 tons and carries up to 40 passengers.

At 550 feet high, the Higher Roller is the largest observation wheel in the world, more than 100 feet higher than the popular London Eye attraction.

Mauch said the High Roller offers a smooth, 30-minute ride inside cabins with upscale finishes as well as panoramic views. “It’s spectacular.”

Mauch said Leitner-Poma also is involved in a project to construct a cable-hauled train at the Miami International Airport, one of the busiest hubs in the world.

What’s branded as a MiniMetro is expected to transport more than 30 million passengers annually with two cable-hauled trains transporting about 12,000 passengers an hour. The first line is expected to open at the beginning of 2016, with a second line opening a year later.

In addition, Leitner-Poma is involved in a project as part of the construction of the Salesforce Tower in San Francisco, Mauch said.

Scheduled for completion in 2017, the 1,027 tower will be the tallest building in the United States west of the Mississippi River.