This may have a simple factual answer, but it may not, so I’ll start it in IMHO.
I just want to know why it happens so often that when I walk up to a business with a standard set of swinging double doors at the entrance, I’ll find that one of the doors is locked. I don’t mean where one door is actually broken and there’s a sign that says “Please use other door.” I’m talking about being left to guess which door is going to be the correct door.
I encounter this often enough that I don’t believe it’s just an employee forgetting to unlock both doors in the morning, but maybe I’m wrong. Logic would suggest that if you’re intentionally keeping one of them closed, you’d want to let people know which one to use, rather than having them yank on a locked door. But my annoyance usually comes and goes so quickly that I never remember to ask anyone in the store or restaurant by the time I’m actually dealing with an employee. So I’m hoping the wisdom of the Dope can help me, here.
What reason or reasons would a business with double doors have to make only one door available to the public to use?
In many implementations of double swing doors, one of them is designed to be ‘commonly open’ and the other has floor bolts at top and bottom - and is deigned to be opened occasionally to admit wide objects or so that both doors can be pegged open for ventilation.
In particular, the swing of the commonly-open door is often constrained to one direction by a flange on the normally-closed door - unbolting the normally-closed door may result in the commonly-open door being able to swing both ways, and as a result, for the doors to close improperly (with the opening door on the wrong side of the flange).
There are also a few safety issues - if you are walking toward a pair of swing doors that have opened toward you, and are closing - your forward motion is such that you will swing the doors inward, but if you accidentally put your hands in the gap, the doors will fully close on your hand before they begin opening again in the other direction.
I wonder that too except about secondary doors to businesses. It’s so common to have them locked in fast food restaurants that sometimes I go to the main doors first even if the secondary doors are closer to me. I almost said “side doors” but this happens even when the secondary door is actually in front of the business, in full view of the counter, so the “security” excuse won’t fly.
I would say the other door is also designed to be used by people. If it were only designed to be used for wide objects and ventilation, then it would not have been given a nice handle which people yank on all day unsuccessfully.
In my opinion, most of the time this happens because the employees (not the owners) are too lazy to open both doors and are too apathetic to fix the situation after watching people try to use the locked door.
If I ever own a business, not opening both doors will be a fireable offense (maybe with a three strike system or something).
I’ve worked in a building with the “double-door but only one side unlocked ever” for 20 years now. It really is as Mangetout describes- the door is NOT designed for both sides to necessarily be open at all times. The usually-closed side really serves more of a structural purpose most of the time, and is only intended to be opened occasionally. And if it didn’t have the “nice handle”, how else would it be used when needed?
If you open it once a year, it doesn’t need a handle. Just unlock it and push on it.
I guess I just don’t get this thought process:
Install double doors.
Most businesses unlock both of their doors, but your doors are special, so keep one door locked so customers cannot use it.
Most business that have one door locked have some way of telling customers (a sign, lack of handle, etc), but that is for square businesses, we are unique. We will make sure customers cannot tell which one doesn’t work.
Profit!
Make the non-operational door opaque. Make it not have a handle. Come up with something interesting. But making some customers frustrated can’t be helpful to anyone.
I’ve seen examples where the normally-closed door had no handles - I guess because it was assumed that it would only be opened by people in charge of the building, and they would grasp the door edge to move it.
I’ve seen half-width doors like this too - which clearly are structural until you have a wide load, then they are temporarily a door.
It will very often be because the second door is special - it acts as part of the door frame for the one that opens - the doors actually work differently (and not so well for some purposes) if they are both free to open.
This is actually what I most often observe - the non-opening door is normally obscured by advertisement material or some such, and the opening door is the one with the push/pull sticker on it
My experience has been that if the door IS designed to be opened on both sides (larger stores, for example) 99% of the people will use the one people are already going in and out of and are too lazy to open another door. They’ll stand there and wait until there’s an opening in the stream of people coming out of the store so they can use the same door to go in. It drives me nuts because they’re usually standing right in front of the other working door, blocking it so I can’t use it.
I don’t want to sound like a edgy 14 year old, but man, people in a crowd are such sheep. Definitely noticed the same phenomenon. I’ve opened the second door a few times and exclaimed “this door works too!” with a sarcastic shocked look my face.
Well, it’s probably true that most people aren’t focused on the immediate task of opening a door in order to get into a store (maybe they are more so when it’s raining or cold outside). That doesn’t make them sheep, just inattentive.
I agree that, if a business is going to have double doors with one of them inoperative, it should be really, really obvious which one is the correct one to use. Having no handle seems like one obvious move, there are probably others.
Of course, as we have fewer and fewer actual stores and our entire commercial life moves towards being conducted online, this whole question will become moot. Then the issue becomes, why don’t homes come with secure drop-boxes for delivered items?
Guilty. I run a business with double doors but most times only one is unlocked. I did not know it bothered anyone until now. I will make a point of unlocking both going forward.