Generate the answer for a given question. The question requires common knowledge of English. Make sure that the answer is in detail, long, consistent with the context, and requires general knowledge of English. To be less repetitive, please vary your language for each question. Give a proper explanation to answer, and if necessary, provide the definition of various terms. And conclude your answer if it's long. If you have used other resources (e.g., Merriam Webster's.) to answer the question, include citations in your answer. You don't need to paraphrase the context of your resources, but make sure that your answer is consistent and complete.

The first time I encountered the word 'gondola' was as a 20 year old on her first visit to Venice. Gondolas, to me, were written in my memory as a flat, fancy, romantic (and expensive to ride) boat structures that traverse the canals of Venice, Italy. But soon thereafter, on my first visit to Banff, Canada (Canadian Rockies) -- Gondolas was also the term for ski-like lifts (enclosed from the elements) to get from the bottom to the top of steep mountains (vice versa). What is the etymology of 'gondola'? And how did it develop to reference two completely different transportation devices? One on water, the other on mountains? What is the relationship besides their obvious transportation connect?.
Some of the successive meanings given in the OED are: 1a. ' A light flat-bottomed boat or skiff in use on the Venetian canals, having a cabin amidships and rising to a sharp point at either end; it is usually propelled by one man at the stern with a single oar.' U.S. A large flat-bottomed river boat of light build; a lighter; used also as a gun-boat. 4a. '= gondola-car n. U.S.', which is glossed as 'U.S. a railway car having a platform body with low sides.' 4b. 'An elongated car attached to the under side of a dirigible balloon or airship. [German, Dutch gondel.] Also transf., applied to a structure that resembles such a car in its purpose and mode of attachment.' 4c. 'The car attached to a ski-lift. Also gondola lift.' So the crucial step appears to be the cabin of an airship (which is long and low), and then a cabin suspended from something. This kind of semantic drift is very common.