The Grand Canyon Skywalk is a horseshoe-shaped cantilever bridge with a glass walkway in Arizona near the Colorado River on the edge of a side canyon in the Grand Canyon West area of the main canyon. USGS topographic maps show the elevation at the Skywalk’s location as 4,770 ft and the elevation of the Colorado River in the base of the canyon as 1,160 ft, and they show that the height of the precisely vertical drop directly under the skywalk is between 500 ft and 800 ft.

Commissioned and owned by the Hualapai Indian tribe, it was unveiled March 20, 2007, and opened to the general public on March 28, 2007. It is accessed via the Grand Canyon West Airport terminal or a 120-mile drive from Las Vegas. The Skywalk is east of Meadview and north of Peach Springs with Kingman being the closest city of some size.

Cornerstone of a larger plan

According to Hualapai officials, the cost of the Skywalk was $30 million. Future plans for the Grand Canyon Skywalk complex include a museum, movie theater, VIP lounge, gift shop, and several restaurants including a high-end restaurant called The Skywalk Café where visitors will be able to dine outdoors at the canyon’s rim. The Skywalk is the cornerstone of a larger plan by the Hualapai tribe, which it hopes will be the catalyst for a 9,000-acre development to be called Grand Canyon West; it would open up a 100-mile stretch along the canyon’s South Rim and include hotels, restaurants, a golf course, casinos, and a cable car to ferry visitors from the canyon rim to the Colorado River, which has been previously inaccessible.