104 comments
A couple of years ago we bought a building with an idle freight elevator. The elevator was overdue for test/inspection (required every 5 years) to remain legal. The service company quoted $5k for the test/inspection, which would not include the cost of any subsequent necessary repairs. Since we didn't need the lift, we decided to just leave it out of service, but the local OSHA office still requires $645/year to leave it marked idle. What a racket.
Stories like this make me a bit suspicious. It reads like some publicist - for the building owners maybe? or for elevator repair companies lobbying for something? - contacted the author or the website and said "I've got a great story for you, America is in an ELEVATOR CRISIS!" At first the writer yawned, but worked on this piece sporadically when there was nothing else to do, and several months later there was a slow news day, so might as well put this up.
I can understand saying there are some issues here, but "elevator crisis"? Yeah OK.
I was previously an elevator mechanic and the cost to keep an elevator serviced is not cheap. Major breakdowns can cost an insane amount. Insurance is extremely expensive for businesses that service elevators and its often less lucrative to service passenger elevators. Freight elevators are even more expensive and the repairs are far more frequent due to equipment tearing them up. Consider the current laws on handicap access to a building and how costly keeping these units serviced could be, just to stay compliant. Cable driven systems are most common type for buildings above 3 stories and regulations require cable changes every 5-15 years. Inspections are due every year and some areas will shut down your elevator for noncompliance. Hydraulic elevators usually require the hoistway roof removed and cranes are required. The work is dangerous and even seasoned mechanics die for making a single mistake. Dont even get me started on how the big guys like Thyssen turned their systems into proprietary designs that require special software and interface hardware, all for the sake of locking in clientele. An old dover controller was made to last and be serviced, but all the old systems are becoming more scarce each year. It may not be a crisis, but there's more to this than you think. Regulations and corporate meddling has turned a once stable ecosystem into a money pit. I'm all for the regulations, there's a reason I'm a previous elevator mechanic.
What is your opinion on machine room-less elevators? The newer ones with a relatively small motor at the top floor of the shaft or on the car? I think that they use a rubber belt? They seem slower and less sturdy to me. I prefer riding in a hydraulically- or cable-driven elevator.
It’s just Axios’ (annoying) house style. All their articles are like this.
Sounds like the author got stuck in an elevator and decided to kill time by writing about elevators on their phone.
Strong Towns writes about a lot of this stuff. America loves to build but are loathe to care about maintenance.
Something as simple as municipal cash accounting (instead of double entry accounting) is how tons of cities are finding themselves broke after a maintenance cycle without growth.
Strong towns writes that all the time. However an examination shows they are wrong. The maintenance things they write about are a small percentage of budgets and so cannot be why cities go broke. (except for cherry picked examples that do not generalize to other cities)
I'm very interested in any citations you have about where they are wrong. Not because I'm trying to nerdsnipe, but genuinely because their thesis seems incredibly plausible, and would explain the development pattern in North America over the last 70 years. If the thesis is demonstrably wrong, I don't want to be wrong, or promote incorrect things.
>The maintenance things they write about are a small percentage of budgets and so cannot be why cities go broke.
The thesis is that the maintenance things they write about are only small because they are based on significant growth of revenues. The other issue they note is that maintenance costs are non-linear, in that they are irregular from year-to-year, so large cost all hit at once, even if they are predictable.
https://www.dsm.city/departments/finance/operating_budget.ph... is the finances from the city of Des Moines. It doesn't really give a breakdown in quite the way I stated, but it appears that a large part of the city budget is not at all related to infrastructure. In the US most cities will publish their budget (It is required by law in many states) so you can dig in more if you want.
I mean, so, right away, debt service is 17% of their budget. That should immediately be a red flag. Is it the end of the world? Of course not, but that's a non-trivial part of the budget that is dedicated to interest alone which strongly inhibits the ability for the city to borrow in an emergency situation.
Again, the issues that Strong Towns addresses is that the costs are not generally visible in the budgets, because they are on a cash accounting basis, and not an accrual accounting basis. There is no balance sheet in the traditional sense, and the spending on infrastructure is non-linear. So here, there is no depreciation of infrastructure in this budget except for city automobiles. The worry that Strong Towns is exactly that the depreciation and amortization expenses will overwhelm a budget when they come due.
We know that the city has limited borrowing capacity from their most recent airport expansion, where they are giving up parking revenue to investors: https://www.desmoinesregister.com/story/money/business/devel...
Again, if I'm wrong, I want to know, but the entire point that Strong Towns illustrates is that these cash accounting based budgets, like this one, do not illustrate future liabilities in terms of ongoing revenues.
America loved to build _in the past_. Now the workers cost too much, even when paid poorly, and the top must profit on an exponential curve.
IDK about America but in my country this has been in the news for a while. It takes months for elevators at train stations to get fixed because there is a huge shortage of parts. And this means people in wheelchairs have to crawl down the stairs to the train platform.
probably anecdotal, but I live in a new apartment building <2 years old. near CONSTANT elevator issues. 1-2 of the 3 elevators are out at a time. its been this way for a year.
can't wait for my lease to end.
Read Bernays' "Propaganda" and everything will make sense.
I don't understand. Stories like what? The article points out a problem and the risks and the consequences. What are you talking about? Is there anything you specifically object to? Do you think elevator maintenance isn't an issue in the US? Have you seen reporting elsewhere saying it isn't an issue or it's overblown? Or is this just a vibe thing? Why is the quality of HN comments becoming this bad? Your comment took zero effort to write. It's just "nuh-uh".
Did you read that article? It was light on details, made a bunch of claims without giving any indication of enough investigation to believe those are facts. I've ready many HN comments that are more believable.
I read the article. It provided pretty much all the facts required to get a sense of the problem. All Axios articles are written like this and it's great to get a no-nonsense or no fluff glimpse of a particular topic I wouldn't have found out about otherwise. If you want an exposé, this is the wrong site.
Duopoly on elevators means no competition. Duopoly exists due to excessive regulation. Some regulation is good but sometimes it gets out of hand and no competition is possible
From the (extremely brief) article it sounds like the problem isn't excessive regulation, but a lack of broad standards. I.e. a point against federalism and Nixon's axing of federal building codes.
Each state carries it's own regulations and many have numerous code books for grandfathered systems to the new modern systems. The sad part is many elevators stay in a sad state of repair because an overhaul would also require it meet all new code, which is vastly more restrictive to the hardware and safety designs. Its a gridlock that is controlled by the big elevator companies.
A few years ago, UCSD finished building a new parking garage next to the building I worked in. It wasn't open for more than a month or two before both elevators had to be taken out of service. I spoke to the technicians on the top deck-there were cables being taken out of both shafts...apparently, the new elevators used synthetic (polyaramid?) core rope; whereas the CA regs specified steel wire rope only. Took like two weeks to get everything replaced, and I'm pretty sure they couldn't reuse the stuff they took out....
So CA regs had an extremely clear specification and the builders didn't follow it?
Why not? Never mind that steel cables have been standard in elevators for literally a hundred years, have never had any systemic problems, and aren't expensive.
I guess. It may have been a county thing; but it was the first time I'd ever heard of elevator cables being made out of anything but wire rope.
Duopoly’s produce excessive regulation as a means of protection.
Duopolies grow out slow growth, once the pie stops growing stealing customers is hard and is a zero sum game, reaching a comfortable stasis which then becomes the status quo is how organisms in these environments behave
> comfortable stasis
man, someone needs to disrupt the elevator business.
For example, why can't personal homes have elevators? The arguments of older people not being able to take stairs or getting hurt apply at home.
Or maybe busboys for groceries from the garage to the kitchen? Make them go sideways like the enterprise (the ncc-1701 enterprise)
Home elevators are a thing. We had one in our previous house, as did many other homes in the neighborhood. They are not terribly expensive, about $12k/floor during construction.
Not the US, but my dad just got one installed in his two story home, cost him around US$25k for installation of the lift/elevator itself, although he incurred a few grand more on modifications to create a space to install it in (would have been more but he did some of them himself). Not a new house, around 40-50 years old. In part, he got the idea because one of his neighbours had already done it. Plus his partner has dementia and climbing stairs has been becoming an ever increasing challenge for her.
We saw a new house with an elevator when we were looking, but it seemed to be an accessibility quota thing, I don’t want to think what it costs to maintain and what kind of inspections it needs.
Generally home eaevators are made of things that don't need inspections. Screws will last for decades without issues and when they fail rescue workers can get you out. Those systems are too slow and expensive for use commercial buildings but good enough for a short house. Thus commercial buildings will use a cable which is cheaper and faster but they stretch and break over time so you must do safety inspection. (a house sized screw is under a grand so not really a big factor in price, but that much cable will get several floors.
some commercial builings use hydraulic elevators which when they break just slowly lower you to the bottom floor . Again much less inspections needed because they are desirned safe. but the slow speed and cost mean only a few floors are possible
Cable systems are not cheap. The biggest issue with cables is the cores dry out. Hydraulic doesn't have to be slow by any means and they dont just seep down unless you blow a seal on the cylinder. Even then it would take an hour under a full load to move a story. Thats a lot of hydraulic fluid to displace. Hydraulic elevators are also prone to issues with cold temperature as the oil can become quite viscous when not in regular use.
I was thinking a hose break not a seal which would fall much faster. Which is why you would design them slow - if a hose breaks they are still a safe fall. (of course if you make them fast then you need more inspection, a trade off)
That said I'm not an elevator expert. The details I've given so far is about all I know. So if/when someone claims to be an expert and contradicts me - well they could be right.
Maintenance was essentially zero. No regular official inspections needed, but we had an elevator company come out every 3-4 years for a general inspection. Ours was a 3 story hydraulic unit.
I would ask kindly that nobody 'disrupt' the elevators I use to go into work.
How can a duopoly produce regulation? That'd be straight out corruption unless someone came up with a new word for it that suddenly made that legal, moral, and efficient.
Lobbying has a pretty pronounced effect and is completely legal
What duopoly? Just off the top of my head, there is at least Schindler, Otis, Kone, Toshiba, ThyssenKrupp, and Mitsubishi.
They're all very expensive systems that lock you into contracts. No one outside of their offices are allowed to service them and if you dont like it, you can buy a controller overhaul from any of the other big guys. Thyssen had some horrible controllers in the 90s and upkeep on those flaky things was criminal. Not a duopoly, more like a lightbulb cartel.
they are very expensive, because the are all custom built, and need engineering drawings, while bieng regulated under the whims of the local building code....industry. The reality is that elevators are not "cut to length" from a big block of elevator stuff, and the machines with longer travels at greater speeds will have(almost) no comanality with lower,slower instalations. And very much like aviation, someone has to keep track of each registered elevator, the engineering drawings, parts lists, drawings for the parts, service procedures, testing and certification. And like say: doing a hot upgrade swap, on the OS, for a major telecom, downtime is taboo. Its not just a door, with a box and some rope.
> Duopoly exists due to excessive regulation.
Or some things are simply hard.
Many companies are capable of doing hard but navigating vague and complex regulations requires deep pockets and institutional connections. In theory the regulations are the same for everyone but because they are often vague regulators have broad interpretation powers. Established players have favorable agreements in place with regulators on how to interpret these regulations that new entrants would not and would have to spend years negotiating these rules. That requires really deep pockets like uber level capital.
It isn't that nobody else can it is that navigating them the first time costs alot and so you need to do many to ammortize the costs over. Cars are very regulated but humans buy enough that you can start a new company anyway.
Counterpoint: VISA and Mastercard.
The tech isn’t too hard.
Getting billions across many different cultures to trust you with money is hard.
They have numerous competitors, from American Express to PayPal. Even crypto could be a competitor. But they have trust problems, are too expensive, or provide no benefit to the purchasers.
Credit cards in general are hard to disrupt as they pay a substantial kickback to the people who would otherwise be adopters of a new technology.
As a high income, technologically savvy, globally mobile person, I am who a payment company would need to flip to drive broad global payment adoption. Unfortunately for them, credit cards are enormously valuable to me as is due to points and perks.
The legal compliance issues are probably just as hard as establishing trust.
The trust is also hard because it are selling at 30-100 year product. If your company goes bankrupt than they buyer might be forced to spend a lot of money replacing the elevator. Think fiskar electric cars except much more expensive and harder to replace.
No, as the alternatives are in the market, so they have solved the compliance issues (sufficiently at least to avoid getting shut down). It is simply that they cannot get customers onboard.
In other words, excessive regulation makes the trustworthiness hard.
How does excess regulation keep PayPal from being a payment alternative? People can currently use PayPal to do business if they wish. You could take PayPal transfers at a grocery store.
There is a case for regulation blocking crypto in some areas, but certainly not all and it still has yet to find meaningful traction as a payment processing mechanism.
With credit cards it is more so lack of regulation. With low enough caps on fees it is lot less of an problem. Still should mandate them to serve all customers. And only kick them out after certain fraud threshold.
“Nearly 1.1 million Americans end up in the emergency room every year due to incidents stemming from taking the stairs”
I used this reasoning to argue that a “take the stairs” campaign by the healthy workplace committee at work was a bad idea. They didn’t want to hear it.
Stair height matters, most businesses have a spiral staircase with platforms at each floor at a minimum (usually every half floor). That already cuts down the injury risk.
Further, for people under 60 a significant factor in falling down stairs is alcohol (about 30%).
Finally, if you look at who ends up in the emergency room, it's generally old people with brittle bones. In fact, that appears to be where the 1.1 million number comes from, people over 65. https://nfsi.org/national-floor-safety-institute-comments-on...
If you are sober, younger than 65, and capable, taking the stairs is a good choice. It's a decent low impact cardio exercise.
There's not much reason not to at least take the stairs when going down. It's minimal exertion, even for >10 floors, and likely ~ as fast as waiting for the elevator, making stops, etc.
Interestingly, going down might be the worst case for stairs :)
While climbing stairs is fairly low impact on the joints, descending is high impact (depending on how fast you go).
There are not much health benefits from going down stairs beyond what you'd get from regular walking. There are some (mostly minor) risks.
Just something to think about. (yes, I take the stairs up and down).
OK, but still more sober, young, capable people slip and fall and get hurt on stairs than using an elevator. And my office had its share of older, unfit people (not sure about drinkers).
> OK, but still more sober, young, capable people slip and fall and get hurt on stairs
Yes and statistically, that's rare and those individuals will be fine [1]. The danger increases exponentially with age primarily because bones get brittle and muscles weaker as you get older.
> And my office had its share of older, unfit people (not sure about drinkers).
Who I specifically mentioned should probably not take the stairs. I'm not on an anti elevator crusade. I'm also not universalizing stair usage. However, using the slip and fall statistic to say "take the stairs is a bad idea" is simply a bad argument.
[1] https://injuryfacts.nsc.org/all-injuries/deaths-by-demograph...
After the first person gets hurt, and calls an injury lawyer with a story of "they told me to take the stairs" you may reconsider whether this is a bad argument.
This is such a tired troupe.
Yes, anyone can sue over anything. No, you won't win a stairway lawsuit if the stairways are maintained and other alternatives exist. You are unlikely to find lawyers to represent you (at least not on contingency) if there's nothing wrong with the stairway. A good lawyer would advise you not to sue.
This is a bad argument because it assumes that lawsuits over injuries are always easy to win and costly. They aren't.
Here's a California slip and fall ambulance chaser laying out exactly these facts. [1]
I know it's likely stairs killed your grandma but give it a rest. As I stated in the beginning and gave facts/figures for, stairways are safe for most everyone. Just avoid them if you've been drinking or you're old.
[1] https://www.salamatilaw.com/slip-and-fall-lawyer-los-angeles...
People are not hurt by using an elevator but the lack of physical activity has negative health impacts and taking stairs is an exercise.
2.2 Million people are injured in bathrooms every year, we should ban those too...
Every year, several people die from falling out of bed.
Wait, we need to know the statistics of people who died by reading alarming statistics.
93.7% of those were made on the spot.
that is a terrible argument to not use the stairs :)
I have coworkers who are in this risk group because they never take the elevator...or do anything that requires effort where a no-effort bypass exists.
[dead]
The article barely mentions unions which are a driver of extra cost. The International Union of Elevator Constructors (IUEC) requires that elevators be assembled on-site rather than prefabricated in many cases for job security.
Why is it better to reduce income and working conditions for workers rather than to reduce income for building owners? Why shouldn't the workers be paid well? Cutting their pay and working conditions probably won't help much with the labor shortage either.
Prefab would increase the working conditions of workers. A factory is generally less dangerous than a construction site. Workers should be paid fairly - paying them too much robs everyone else. (what is fair is subject to debate of course)
Paying everyone else robs workers. Neither has some moral superiority (except one is doing the work).
"In a story beloved by economists it’s said that Milton Friedman was once visiting China when he was shocked to see that, instead of modern tractors and earth movers, thousands of workers were toiling away building a canal with shovels. He asked his host, a government bureaucrat, why more machines weren’t being used. The bureaucrat replied, 'You don’t understand. This is a jobs program.' To which Milton responded, 'Oh, I thought you were trying to build a canal. If it’s jobs you want, you should give these workers spoons, not shovels!'"
https://marginalrevolution.com/marginalrevolution/2019/08/sp...
Milton Friedman isn't beloved by all, and I'm not talking about reducing efficiency.
I wonder how much pre-fabrication would save. At least with cable elevators. In the end elevators are rather precision machines and buildings are often less than perfect. Also doorways can be smaller than the cars so building them inside shaft is often needed.
> "Everyone is born needing an elevator, and if they're lucky they die needing one too," says Stephen Smith
I cannot understand what this could mean.
> the U.S. would benefit from federal elevator standards
What would the constitutional basis for those be?
Implication is along the lines of "We all need accessibility features sometimes" , I assume. Show a newborn the stairs and see how they do vs an elevator (though I assume the buttons would flummox them), and extreme age will make stairs difficult (whereas being run down by a motorist at 45 prevents needing an elevator in old age)
I think it's a little bit forced with the elevator example, but I fully agree with the argument that "We all need the accessibility features sometimes". It can be something as small as needing crutches for a sprain (elevator), your arms being full of groceries or bringing coffee by for coworkers (door-opening button), or because your toddler struggles with stairs (and a ramp is less of a tumble if they take one)
Parents with strollers/babies benefit from elevators. And old people and people with mobility issues also benefit from elevators.
Those are the two extremes (babies, and old people).
And everyone in between would also benefit any time they have to carry anything up a flight of stairs, of course.
> What would the constitutional basis for those be?
Interstate commerce just like almost everything else.
Not sure, but I understood this phrase to mean that maternity wards are in hospitals that almost always come with elevators. The same with end of life care, people will likely be in a building with an elevator rather than outside.
Congress can set standards for weight and measures. So they could set a standard car size or something like that - the question is should they. I don't know.
It means:
• if you are lucky enough to live until old, you'll likely need an elevator. • if you are unlucky enough to die young, you'll likely not need an elevator.
The point is another: why.
We need to consume less, so we need new buildings, and that's will be as well in the future, so we need to been able to rebuild at little costs, HOMES and SHEDS respond to such needs, not high rise. High rise nowadays respond only to construction industry need to maximize their own profits.
> "Everyone is born needing an elevator, and if they're lucky they die needing one too,"
What does this saying mean?
And what's with the weird article formatting? Is it targeted at people with short attention spans or is it some kind of AI garbage?
It means they live long enough to reach a point where stairs are no longer possible for them. Not sure I agree necessarily but the point makes sense - live to old age. It serves the elderly, of which we all want to be one (eventually).
This is why it's so important for elderly people to prevent sarcopenia by eating a high protein diet and engaging in frequent, hard resistance training. Many of them just let themselves waste away but in most cases this can be prevented.
If that's the point I'll disagree. My 84 year old mother is still climbing the stairs. If we're lucky we'll never need an elevator, though we might like one for the sake of convenience.
I think they mean that you live long enough that you die from your body becoming too frail, not from dying too soon.
I understand. My point was a lot of people live long, fulfilling lives and then drop dead from a heart attack without ever losing mobility. Loss of mobility is not guaranteed, even for people who live very long lives.
Not much point in living if you’re that incapacitated.
That's a pretty insensitive point of view. I hope you live long enough to be able to make this choice.
That depends. I have known some where they can't do anything so what is the point. However I know many who are no longer able to walk well but they can still do most of their hobbies and so overall still enjoy life.
There's no point to living if you're in a wheelchair? If you get around with a walker?
I mean, of course that up to each individual to decide, my comment is my opinion only. For me, it doesn't seem like it would be much of a life.
are you a Canadian doctor?
Oh, I see. Thanks.
That's Axios' standard format and concept: Their service is highly efficient news, and it's formatted - with that structure, bullet points, etc. - to facilitate that.
Axios's whole thing is succinct articles.
It’s time buildings have RAIEs: redundant arrays of independent elevators.
Most do. While you do see buildings with one elevator, almost all of them have more than one right next to each other. While it is theoretically possible to make an elevator that pair that uses the opposite car as a counterweight and thus each must stop at all floors that is rare (the only examples I can think of are funicular trains that stop at the top and bottom only - while technically elevators not trains everyone thinks of them as trains)
RAIE-0 with just two elevators is obviously not enough. We need them with more redundant elevators.
Again, lack of labor and supply of parts; you hear the same thing over and over. Where are this great capitalist economy and superhuman capitalists? There is demand; why isn't our marketplaced supplying the need?
Something doesn't add up.
I don't know elevators but in my industry the parts are electronic chips that we bought from someone else and now they don't make. There was nothing wrong with the HVAC controller we designed 20-30 years ago, but it used a no longer available 16 bit CPU (for what it does an 8 bit CPU would work). We have a new one for new stuff with all new code (no longer written in assembly), but it isn't a drop in replacement for the old one.
> lack of labour
Thanks unions
Would you like to support your two word claim?
Yet another reason to prefer rural and suburban living. Can't remember the last time I took an elevator.