An overhead or gantry crane and hoist can have two types of brakes: (a) a physical brake shaped like a disc or a drum (think about that brake which you see behind the wheels on your car) that is spring-set when the controls are release; (b) a dynamic brake, where the entirety of the machinery is used to stop the crane.
What the heck do we mean by that? In short, there are very few differences between a motor and a generator. Feed electricity into a motor on your overhead crane and motion comes out of the motor and rolls the crane. Let off the controls and the crane coasts, feeding motion back into the motor, and electricity comes out of the motor and goes back into the wires. Just as it might take five horsepower of electricity to move the crane, the crane can generate horsepower by coasting to a stop. That energy is either dissipated as heat through a resistor grid (like a space heater) or fed back into the power system.
Many modern cranes use dynamic brakes to slow the travel (bridge and trolley) motions of the overhead crane. Quite a few do the same for hoisting motions, and as time goes on, it becomes standard. There is still a physical brake that engages when the crane comes to a stop, acting as a parking brake.