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[Ghundio]

I was planning on doing my next fortress centered around an automated elevator shaft and was wondering if you guys could help me work out the kinks

This would be dug rotating 90 degrees clockwise every level down. The center would be hollowed out to allow power down to the bottom. I think you have to designate the tracks from the bottom up. There are still two real issues plaguing this as it is now. Every time I try and designate this thing my miners will eventually trap themselves by digging to deep with mining out their escape path or fall down the shaft in the middle for some reason. The other issue is entering the elevators up, I'm pretty sure coming in directly and hitting a roller would work to push the carts in the right direction at the T junction but more testing needs to be done. Also it would be cool to figure out how to set up pressure plates to stop potential collisions and have the cart autodump at the right spot.

Legend:
+ empty floor
# wall
R roller
G gear-assembly
= horizontal shaft
> down ramp
< up ramp

#	#	#	+	>
#	<	#	#	+
#	R	G	=	R
#	>	+	#	+
#	#	#	#	<

[Ghundio]

I fixed the dwarfs getting themselves stuck by designating up down stairs in the center first and then removing them and explicitly designating the up ramps. Although now the problem of having a minecart exit the downramp spiral at the right level. 

[Triaxx2]

The only solution would be to have a stop at the requested level. The problem is that they'd then get off every time they hit that level. The only other option is to have the shaft be larger so that there can be more than one route. You'd need one dwarf full time running the levers to ensure everyone ends up on the right level, unless you had multiple stations to start from, but I don't know if they could all use the same track.

[CaptainArchmage]

The best method I can think of getting off is to have a turn in the tracks. If you want the carts to stop at a particular level, you have a drawbridge lowered so the carts keep going, and stop. If you want the carts to bypass a particular level, you have the drawbridge raised and the carts will turn and keep on going upwards.

[Ghundio]

The best method I can think of getting off is to have a turn in the tracks. If you want the carts to stop at a particular level, you have a drawbridge lowered so the carts keep going, and stop. If you want the carts to bypass a particular level, you have the drawbridge raised and the carts will turn and keep on going upwards.

I'm not really sure how drawbridges work with carts so if you could draw up a picture or something that would be really helpful to me.

Otherwise I think I've got a way using switches to get entering and exiting at a level working correctly. I also think I have a pretty good system for making a queue for entering the elevator and returning to the correct floor. The main problem is that it is pretty power intensive