I’m not sure I get it… people shouldn’t use the elevator? Because someone doesn’t want the elevator to stop more times than for them? Isn’t the elevator for everyone, or did I miss a memo? 
People do this all the time in my building. If it were up to me then yeah, I’d rather they take the stairs, it’s less traffic and less wear on the elevator (I own). But it’s not up to me, and there’s nothing in the association rules that bans 2nd and 3rd floor owners and renters from taking the elevator as they come and go. And if they follow the association rules and pay fees/rent then I’m happy to have them as neighbors.
So yeah, I think the OP needs to take a deep breath and calm down.
Lazy fuckers piss me off too. I get on the elevator only when I need to go up more than 2 floors. This happens all the time in the library. I get on the elevator to go up 5 floors. Sure enough, after passing a single floor, it stops to pick someone up who is too fat or lazy to walk up one flight of stairs.
Where is this insistence? I don’t think he’s ever said, “Excuse me, ma’am, I noticed you only took the elevator up one floor. In the future when moving up less than three floors, take the goddamn stairs.” Rather, he’s annoyed that people do this. What’s so wrong with being annoyed by lazy people wasting everyone else’s time?
On a related note, I don’t move when I’m on the escalator. Its there for those who don’t want to walk down the stairs. If one is in a hurry, then they should take the stairs!
However, I really don’t get the OP at all. The elevator should only be used by those on certain floors? Its only there for the handicapped?
What the shit? So you walk to the whole time, walk to the escalator, walk when you’re off, but once you’re on the escalator, no movement at all? Escalator = stairs that move. Get there faster! Right? Reminds of me that Family Guy bit where Peter and someone else were in a chase, and they ran everywhere, but the entire time they were on the escalator, they stood perfectly still.
You’d most likely get stabbed in a week if you did this in DC. I learned very, very quickly that standers go to the right and allow walkers to the left. If you stood in the middle/left and didn’t move, you’d get yelled at. As you should be.
Everytime you use the elevator, you inconvenience other passengers. If you can easily avoid using the elevator, it is expected that you don’t. Handicapped can’t avoid it. Those going 3 or more floors can’t avoid it. Those moving just one floor or two, yet perfectly capable of taking the stairs, CAN AVOID IT. When they don’t, I get to punch them as retribution for wasting my time. Is that clear enough for you?
Oh, well there’s your problem, right there.
No, it shouldn’t.
Wow. First you use troll incorrectly when you yourself are trolling, and now you start using RO incorrectly. I’m starting to doubt your intelligence. RO = Recreational Outrage = Being mad at something that doesn’t affect you. The OP is mad at something that does affect him. It may seem trivial, but it is not RO.
(sigh) Can we just put a sticky somewhere that says “Fact: Everyone you don’t like is a troll”?
I agree that you should take the stairs up 3 flights and then get on the elevator. That way, you will have the exact same level of inconvenience as everybody else. Do you pay more rent for your 20th floor unit than the 1st-, 2nd- & 3rd-floor dwellers for the expressed privilege of elevator use? If not, then it’s not fair that they have to walk up 1, 2 and 3 floors while you don’t, just because your floor is higher up. So take the stairs up 3 floors, then ride the elevator the rest of the way.
How is that the “exact same level of inconvenience”?
I’d genuinely like to know how much time each of the following takes:[ul]
[li]Riding the elevator up or down 20 floors nonstop[/li][li]Riding the elevator up or down 20 floors while other people are getting on and off to ride it one or two floors[/li][li]Taking the stairs up or down one or two floors[/li][li]Taking the stairs up or down 2 floors, then getting on the elevator and riding it the other 18[/li][/ul]
Then we can figure out which ones of these represent the same level of inconvenience.
Bullshit
Tell us, Karnak, how exactly you can tell if someone is capable of walking up a flight of stairs? Do you have some sort of detector that tells you that someone standing next to you on the elevator doesn’t have some sort of non-obvious situation that prevents them from doing so?
Here’s a clue: your time isn’t more important than anyone else’s. Get over your big bad self.
I would also like to add that some buildings, for instance where I work, only have certain floors available to access from inside the staircase. If I am on the 8th floor, unless someone left the door propped open, I **cannot **get to the 9th floor unless I use the elevator.
I suppose it’s only fair; I’ve doubted yours since joining the boards.
Oh, how we all adore it when some stranger pops up with a “new rule”!
Maybe, as a thought experiment, the next time one of those ‘inconsiderate jerks’ has the nerve to ride in ‘your’ elevator to a floor you deem unnecessary, you should check your watch and see exactly how many seconds those rude people inconvenience you.
My guess is less than 30.
Either that or find out where the OP lives, follow him into the elevator, and push EVERY SINGLE FLOOR. 
The responses in this thread are surprising me a little bit - it’s like you have an inalienable right to take an elevator any way you want to, without ever considering taking the stairs for a short trip. Of course everyone can use elevators any way you want, but seriously, every time you want to go down one floor? Stairs are free, they don’t cost anything, they don’t use any resources, they give people who desperately need it a little exercise - it’s much greener to use stairs.
I’ve read safety tips for women in a few places, and they’ve suggested taking elevators instead of stairs. I don’t know that I agree, but I will admit that some of the stairwells can be a little unnerving. They’re closed off and feel pretty isolated from the rest of the building. So that could explain it for some of your co-passengers.
Me, I’m usually a stair-taker, with a few exceptions. I have occasional back problems. They don’t put me in a wheelchair, but they make climbing stairs extraordinarily painful. I also had a bad case of bronchitis a couple of years ago that made it impossible for me to climb stairs without coughing till I felt like I’d puke or pass out.
I support using the stairs, but I usually assume that people who don’t have a good reason for it. I’m sure some of them are just lazy, but painting everyone with the same brush is unfair.
DO NOT DISPUTE THE RULINGS OF THE SDMB ILLITERATI
(Seriously, there’s a lot of fat people on here who have “serious health problems” – don’t insult them by insinuating that they are just lazy buttertrolls)
The inconvenience I’m referring to is the exertion needed to climb the few flights of stairs that the OP feels everybody else should do so as not to slow down his trip. I don’t consider having to stand in an elevator an extra 30 seconds an inconvenience on par with climbing a flight or 2 or 3 of stairs. Would you rather stand still for 20 seconds, or climb stairs for 20 seconds, possibly carrying bags of groceries?
It is irrelevant that so many of the posters here are so virtuous and enlightened that they take stairs whenever possible. His right to ride the elevator is no greater than anyone else’s who pays rent in the building. Everybody’s dollar is subsidizing the cost of it. And the elevator is not a finite resource. Everybody will get where they’re going.