I’m posting this in GQ because I’m not pissed off enough to post in the Pit. Anyway, have you ever been waiting for an elevator or waiting at a crosswalk to cross the street, and you’re there before anyone else is and have taken all the necessary steps to insure your elevator comes or the cross signal comes up. Such as pressing the up/down button on an elevator or pressing the crosswalk button at an intersection. When low and behold some moron comes up and presses the already-lit-up elevator button or presses the crosswalk button, again. I better just ask my question, because as I’m writing this I can feel annoyance brewing. So, does pressing the already lit elevator button make the car come any quicker? Does pressing the crosswalk button make the light change any faster? My experience with the crosswalk signals is that when the button is pressed, the light does not change any faster; however, you do get “extra” time to make the cross. I’m looking for answers that will give me the key to the PIT!!!
well, in the movie “Speed” pushing the button again made the elevator blow up. 
(somebody had to do it)
I tell my children that pressing the elevator button several times does make it come faster. It keeps them occupied.
A comedian (and, unfortunately, I can’t remember who… maybe George Carlin) did a bit on this. He proposed a “stupid tax” for just the elevator situation you described. If you press an already-lit button, you’ve gotta pay $5 stupid tax. It was his idea to decrease the amount of stupidity in the world.
Zev Steinhardt
O.k. I will give you the elevator scenario because there is a light to tell you that someone has pressed it in most cases (though some don’t light up in which case it applies here too). But imagine this: I walk into a lobby, or to a street corner, and I have no idea if you are waiting for someone or whether you are indeed planning to take the elevator/ cross the street. Crosswalk buttons don’t tell have a feedback mechanism letting you know they have been pressed, so how would I know? Now I COULD ask you, or I could just press the button to be sure.
Besides, in some cities, asking a random person a question can get your ass kicked (like New York) so I’d RATHER push the button. Or worse yet, it could be LA and the person will use you as their personal therapist until the elevator arrives…
Getting back to the OP …
We designed an elevator control system in college and there was no provision for multiple calls from a floor. Once you pressed the button, that floor was in the queue and then was scheduled to be serviced. Because you service floors in order (top to bottom or bottom to top) you can’t skip a floor just because the next one has more calls.
It’s because some people lie to their kids and tell them it will make the elevator some faster. This continues into adulthood where they annoy us to know end. 
SoMoMom:
I told my kids that the number of times you push the button tells the elevator how many stops it should make before it gets to you. Therefore if you want the elevator to come to you in one stop, just push once. If you want it to stop on every floor on the way down, push it a bunch of times… I didn’t want my kids to seem like retards…
Of course, my plan backfired when they started lecturing adults about how stupid it was to press the elevator button a bunch of times…
Re: Multiple calls
I went to visit a friend in her apt in NYC afew years back. Very fancy, but the elevator took forever to arrive. In my impatience, I pushed the call button, oh, maybe 15 times, figuring it wouldn’t hurt, and might help if some sort of multiple call system exists.
Yup, elevator arrives, door opens…very pissed off looking elevator operator sitting there. Whoda thunk there were any of those jobs left?
“Ha, wouldn’t you figure, some impatient asshole just took the stairs”
“Uh-Huh”
Shaky Jake
[QUOTE]
*So, does pressing the already lit elevator button make the car come any quicker?
Of course it does. If the elevator (or “lift” as we like to call 'em here) has to make several stops before it reaches your floor, you can reduce the amount of time it takes for the door to open and close at each stop by repeatedly pressing the ‘call’ button. It has the same effect as repeatedly pressing a button for a floor when you’re inside the elevator. You’ve all seen movies where a murderer or rapist comes rushing across the floor of a multi-story carpark towards some chick trying to escape in the elevator. The chick frantically pushes the button in the elevator in a desperate effort to make the door close quickly. Sometimes the door shuts just in time, sometimes it doesn’t. But that’s not important right now. My point is this; pushing the call button will reduce the time it takes for the elevator to stop at any floors it has to call at before it stops at yours.
I once designed an elevator mechanism when I was at college. To be honest, my course was more concerned with the mechanics than the electrical systems. That was 10 years ago so I’d be a bit rusty on the subject now.
Still, even if repeatedly pushing the button doesn’t make the elevator come quicker, you’ll accelerate the lifecycle of the button’s switch mechanism which should wear out quicker. This alone should be compensation for your frustation.
It’s my personal experience that in New York, NOBODY gets their ass kicked. People here are too timid to do anything about anything. They’re like Chihuahuas: Lots of yapping and trying to act threatening, until you step towards them. Then they run away and hide behind their master’s (lawyer’s?) leg. I’ve lived here for a year and a half, and people are scared of me because I look where I’m walking instead of at my shoes.
Oh, just so that this isn’t a hijack…
regarding the OP,
No it doesn’t. At least not in my experience. Those poor dumb bastards. I hate that. Maybe they’re just trying to feel like they’re doing their part, or just trying to keep themselves occupied and avoid uncomfortable silences.
The above reference to New Yorkers applies mainly to Manhattanites. I haven’t spent too much time in the other Boroughs (Borough?! WTF is that? Isn’t it the hole rabbits live in?), so I can’t speak for them.