I’ve always seen this argument as complete nonsense, the escalators I use regularly take about 25 seconds standing and about half that walking, so someone blocking me from walking will cost me about 12 seconds, this is totally inconsequential
::applause::
Exquisitely clever.
Running, certainly: but walking, even quite briskly, and sometimes without using the handrail, has been managed successfully by millions over a century or more. The London Underground gave up its standing-only experiment: people were just too used to the “stand on the right, pass on the left” practice, as it’s an effective compromise. It works.
After having the PATH* train door close with me seconds away, causing me to miss my commuter train, with another one not for 40 minutes or more, I can’t just stand on the escalator anymore. “Just leave earlier!” Well, I try that, but things come up at the last minute and I find myself literally running to the PATH. Twelve seconds turns into a 40 minute delay in getting home.
Like I said, people in no particular rush are welcome to stand to one side, and wait in line for the privilege. Just get the heck out of the way of those of us with a connection to make, or a class to attend, or whatever.
As I say above, the average time in the system is unimportant – people who want to get somewhere quicker can do so and people who don’t care how long it takes can wait.
*The PATH train is a small subway system between NYC and NJ.
This. I don’t know why the whole system should change so that people who don’t care how long it takes them to ride an escalator can do so faster.
It’s a little-known fact that 78% of serious escalator injuries happen when cops chase bad guys hurtling down the center divider.
Walk (or stand) on the right, pass on the left is the general pedestrian rule that keeps modern society from descending into crazed anarchy.
Yeah this. To go back to the London Underground as a case in point, half the riders are commuters with somewhere to get to fast, and half are tourists who haven’t a clue where they’re going and don’t care how long it takes to get there. Having two speeds is precisely for this reason. There’s no reason to hinder the commuters so the tourists can go faster.
Escalators are trash anyway. I propose we eliminate them entirely. Stairs for those of us who can use them and elevators for the rest. Every multi-story building in the world except airports and malls gets along just fine without expensive, complicated, high-maintenance, injury-causing escalators. Malls and airports should get with the program.
You have to factor in space and numbers, especially when retrofitting a pre-existing underground railway.
Can we somehow use this slingshot effect to launch things into orbit? Kind of how spacecraft get a gravity assist from a planetary type body?
I disagree about the injury causing escalators. From my cite earlier 90% of escalator/elevator deaths are caused by elevators and 60% of the injuries are caused by elevators. Escalators are relatively safe compared to elevators.
No one is talking about walking on mall or airport escalators – you never can do that anyway – people don’t stand right on those escalators. We’re talking about subways and train stations, where you have experienced commuters who have someplace to be and tourists lollygagging about.
No, everyone walking would slow things down. If everyone stands you can put a person on every step. You can’t pack walkers that densely even if you train them like a team of synchronized swimmers.
That or elevators are more common than escalators.
Per the study, density decreases 30% but on-escalator velocity increases by over 50%, so everyone walking would indeed move more people per minute.
My arithmetic is often wrong though, so I recommend someone check that.
Good point. According to this PDF there are 900,000 elevators in the US and 35,000 escalators. So there are about 2x more deaths per escalator and 10x as many injuries.
Like I said, meat grinders. (Quite literally, if you get the wrong part of yourself caught in the wrong place.) Seriously, people should treat those things with more respect than they do - you’re basically standing (or walking) on top of a moving tank tread.
(Which is not to say that people respect other dangerous equipment either, but still.)
We’d want to normalize by passengers, although I don’t see good data. My building has 2x the elevators as it has escalators, but they transport roughly the same number of people (for whatever reason you have to escalate to or from the elevator lobby unless you want to take a very out-of-the-way accessibility ramp).
Even if escalators are two to ten times more dangerous than elevators, that doesn’t necessarily mean that either is dangerous enough to worry about.
I wonder if the extra exercise is worth the danger, (if it is indeed increased.) Assuming the walkers wouldn’t make up the exercise elsewhere.