The good and the bad things about lifts.
Nowadays nearly every commercial building that is higher than 30ft has a lift. If it doesn’t, it is almost certain that the owner of that property has considered how good it would be if there was a lift in the building, to transport them from the ground floor up to the ever so challenging first floor. It is surprising how many able people will stand and wait for a lift as oppose to walking up one flight of stairs – surely this doesn’t help the current obesity problem the country, and even the world has at this moment in time. Imagine if each able person walked up and down several flights of stairs each day – people wouldn’t even know the meaning of obesity. A few hundred additional calories burnt on each cycle. It must be pointed out however; there are those out there who are physically unable to tackle the stairs, whether it is at home or in the workplace. For the purpose of this blog it is most definitely excluding those individuals.
There are of course times when lifts are nothing but blessings to the population. For example, imagine how much the tourism in certain cities would drop if attractions such as the Empire State Building, Eiffel Tower and even Blackpool Tower didn’t have lifts.
Realistically who wants to walk up thousands of stairs just to look out of a window or over a rooftop? The point being it is perfectly understandable that someone catches a lift to the top of the Empire State Building. Being forced to walk up the mass amount of stairs would just be extremely unreasonable, and it is fair to assume that most people would agree. Other instances where lifts may be considered the perfect system is by way of helping the elderly lady getting to her apartment with her shopping bags, hell, helping anyone who needs to carry heavy items other than themselves up the stairs.
This leads onto the next type of lift that could surely only be considered as a blessing. Goods lifts. Businesses, for example, supermarkets most definitely need lifts, otherwise everyone would be shopping out of basements; either that or it takes months to take the stock up to the shop floor. Even heavy duty lifts that effectively carry items up several floors with ease, just an electric bill, that individuals or even groups of people couldn’t carry.
It could be argued that without lifts, millions of pounds of revenue wouldn’t exist purely due to the time element they could save. Although of the other hand it could be argued they contribute towards the obesity issue many countries have. Maybe they are both – Saints & sinners.
Jenson Dake writes on behalf of Leading Edge Creative Design Ltd
Lifts – Saints Or Sinners
