# Elevators with no floor buttons.
**URL:** https://boards.straightdope.com/t/elevators-with-no-floor-buttons/817747
**Category:** Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share
**Created:** [July 11, 2018, 7:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/elevators-with-no-floor-buttons/817747 "2018-07-11T19:55:07Z")
**Posts on this page:** 12
**Page:** 3
### Author:  [@SantaMan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SantaMan)
#### Post date: [July 16, 2018, 12:50am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/elevators-with-no-floor-buttons/817747/41 "2018-07-16T00:50:50Z")
Imagine 5 groups of people, each group going to a particular floor.
If some of each group got into each of 5 elevators, each elevator would have to stop at each of the 5 floors.
If each of the 5 groups gets their own elevator, then each elevator would only stop at one floor, zipping past the other floors.
Every elevator becomes an express elevator
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### Author:  [@kanicbird](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kanicbird)
#### Post date: [July 16, 2018, 1:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/elevators-with-no-floor-buttons/817747/42 "2018-07-16T01:18:43Z")
> [@SantaMan](#):
>
> Imagine 5 groups of people, each group going to a particular floor.
> If some of each group got into each of 5 elevators, each elevator would have to stop at each of the 5 floors.
> If each of the 5 groups gets their own elevator, then each elevator would only stop at one floor, zipping past the other floors.
> Every elevator becomes an express elevator
Adding low floors can be grouped together, so that elevator can be available much quicker for the next ride.
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### Author:  [@M.Constant](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/M.Constant)
#### Post date: [July 16, 2018, 4:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/elevators-with-no-floor-buttons/817747/43 "2018-07-16T16:38:54Z")
Douglas Adams:
“Not unnaturally, many elevators imbued with intelligence and precognition became terribly frustrated with the mindless business of going up and down, up and down, experimented briefly with the notion of going sideways, as a sort of existential protest, demanded participation in the decision-making process and finally took to squatting in basements sulking.”
Just missed being post 42…
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### Author:  [@kayT](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kayT)
#### Post date: [July 16, 2018, 4:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/elevators-with-no-floor-buttons/817747/44 "2018-07-16T16:48:17Z")
> [@M.Constant](#):
>
> Douglas Adams:
>
> “Not unnaturally, many elevators imbued with intelligence and precognition became terribly frustrated with the mindless business of going up and down, up and down, experimented briefly with the notion of going sideways, as a sort of existential protest, demanded participation in the decision-making process and finally took to squatting in basements sulking.”
>
> Just missed being post 42…
And apparently missed post 38.
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### Author:  [@CairoCarol](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CairoCarol)
#### Post date: [July 17, 2018, 1:19am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/elevators-with-no-floor-buttons/817747/45 "2018-07-17T01:19:38Z")
> [@mixdenny](#):
>
> I was in a professional building last week and came across an elevator system I had not seen before. There were 5 elevators in the hallway. You used a touch screen display to find and select the department you want to visit. It then assigns an elevator to you and that door opens. Step inside and it takes you to the floor you are going to. There are no controls in the car at all, just a light to indicate which floor you stop at. Oh well, what can go wrong?
>
> Dennis
Lots of elevators in Jakarta work like this, or some variation. It can indeed be a problem.
I once had to go to meetings in a building where the system was that you told the receptionist in the lobby where you were going, and she issued you a RFID passkey that would tell the elevator to take you to the correct floor. Silly me, about the third time I went there, instead of saying the office I confidently said “5th floor” and got a pass for the 5th floor.
You can guess how well that turned out.
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### Author:  [@Eva\_Luna](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Eva_Luna)
#### Post date: [July 17, 2018, 4:31am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/elevators-with-no-floor-buttons/817747/46 "2018-07-17T04:31:00Z")
It made me bonkers in my ortho’s building when I was on crutches and just plain couldn’t make it to the elevator by the time the door closed.
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### Author:  [@Eyebrows\_0f\_Doom](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Eyebrows_0f_Doom)
#### Post date: [July 17, 2018, 5:24am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/elevators-with-no-floor-buttons/817747/47 "2018-07-17T05:24:38Z")
Lots of buildings in NYC have these and they work extremely well.
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### Author:  [@friedo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/friedo)
#### Post date: [July 17, 2018, 6:09am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/elevators-with-no-floor-buttons/817747/48 "2018-07-17T06:09:53Z")
> [@BigT](#):
>
> All I see in this thread are people saying it is more efficient without explaining why. The best explanation is just that they can zip back down really fast–but couldn’t you do that without this system, as long as you knew the elevator was empty?
The reason why is obvious. It is faster to run one elevator car with 10 people to a small group of floors than to 10 different floors. Likewise, it is more efficient to put people traveling to the same floor into the same elevator instead of spread amongst multiple elevators.
By having passengers select their floor before boarding, the system can easily sort people going to the same or nearby floors into the same car. The result is that elevators can transport more people in less time, because they make fewer stops each way. That means more trips per car, less wait time for passengers, and less energy used.
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### Author:  [@Fleetwood](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fleetwood)
#### Post date: [July 17, 2018, 12:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/elevators-with-no-floor-buttons/817747/49 "2018-07-17T12:38:24Z")
> [@CairoCarol](#):
>
> Lots of elevators in Jakarta work like this, or some variation. It can indeed be a problem.
>
> I once had to go to meetings in a building where the system was that you told the receptionist in the lobby where you were going, and she issued you a RFID passkey that would tell the elevator to take you to the correct floor. Silly me, about the third time I went there, instead of saying the office I confidently said “5th floor” and got a pass for the 5th floor.
>
> You can guess how well that turned out.
You went to the fifth floor as requested?
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### Author:  [@iamthewalrus\_3](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/iamthewalrus_3)
#### Post date: [July 17, 2018, 6:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/elevators-with-no-floor-buttons/817747/50 "2018-07-17T18:19:53Z")
> [@BigT](#):
>
> I don’t doubt that it’s faster, but I would definitely like a better explanation of _how_ it is faster.
Another useful way to think about why this is faster is to consider a transportation network that already does intelligent routing, and revert it to the old dumb elevator algorithm, where you just get into the first thing that comes along.
Uber (and others) have shared-car options where a group of people going from a similar location to another similar location share a car. This is efficient because the system knows that everyone’s destination is close, so there won’t be a lot of wasted time at either end.
Imagine if they didn’t pay any attention to the destination when assigning you a car. You’d just get in whatever car was closest to you and it would drive all over the damned place getting people to their different destinations. Terribly inefficient.
Obviously, since elevators only travel in one dimension, the efficiency improvements are not as big as on a 2d surface, but they are still substantial.
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### Author:  [@iamthewalrus\_3](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/iamthewalrus_3)
#### Post date: [July 17, 2018, 6:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/elevators-with-no-floor-buttons/817747/51 "2018-07-17T18:21:46Z")
> [@CairoCarol](#):
>
> Lots of elevators in Jakarta work like this, or some variation. It can indeed be a problem.
>
> I once had to go to meetings in a building where the system was that you told the receptionist in the lobby where you were going, and she issued you a RFID passkey that would tell the elevator to take you to the correct floor. Silly me, about the third time I went there, instead of saying the office I confidently said “5th floor” and got a pass for the 5th floor.
>
> You can guess how well that turned out.
I’m assuming the problem is that the office was no longer on the fifth floor, or never was and you misremembered?
But that’s not really a problem with this system. It’s a problem with not knowing where you’re going. An old dumb traditional elevator with buttons would have also taken you to the 5th floor, because you’d have pressed the 5 button, right?
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### Author:  [@CairoCarol](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CairoCarol)
#### Post date: [July 18, 2018, 4:27am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/elevators-with-no-floor-buttons/817747/52 "2018-07-18T04:27:19Z")
> [@Fleetwood](#):
>
> You went to the fifth floor as requested?
Indeed I did. Now assume, for the sake of argument, that my confidence in my ability to remember which floor # I needed to visit was misplaced.
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