ELEVATORS NEED A LIFT
Hands up, those of you who have never been trapped in a broken elevator, or who have never had to traipse up several flights of stairs because of an out-of-service lift, or who have never experienced a flicker of worry when the elevator you were in was, um, not behaving normally. We don’t see very many hands. As The Canadian Press reported this week, problems with elevators in buildings across Canada are widespread — and worsening. While a physically fit younger Canadian might not care too much (taking the stairs is an excellent cardiovascular workout), the disabled, the elderly, parents with small children, our hospitals and other health institutions often depend on this infrastructure.
Here’s a sample of what CP’s Colin Perkel found: In 2014, Ottawa alone saw 314 calls to 911 to help free people from trapped elevators. In the bigger cities, last year, it was worse: Toronto had more than 2,800 emergency calls for elevator rescues, and Montreal had 1,532. Those are just calls for people actually trapped. We don’t have the numbers for elevators that simply went on the fritz and were out of service for days or weeks. But if you work in an office tower, or live in a highrise, you’re all too familiar with this scenario.
There have been a handful of horrible mishaps: In 2015, an 86-year-old Ottawa man had his legs amputated after a faulty elevator crushed them in a seniors’ co-op building. Such accidents are rare. But Ottawans can also cite examples of out-of-commission lifts, such as the one in an eight-storey, 60-unit building on Metcalfe Street that, in recent years, was nonfunctional for months at a time.
That particular example — the elevator in question was more than 50 years old — points to why this problem is growing. Around 1,550 of Ontario’s 18,000 residential building elevators are more than 50 years old, CP reports, and 10,000 are between 25 and 50 years old. One expert called the state of Ontario elevators “a crisis … If we look at the reliability of a large number of pieces of equipment, it’s really the worst it’s ever been.”
The age of elevators and the difficulty of getting spare parts, coupled with the increasing difficulty of finding skilled technicians to service them, and paying those technicians appropriately, are cause for concern. And the four companies that dominate the elevator industry haven’t been talking publicly about solutions.
When we think about aging or crumbling infrastructure, we tend to think roads, bridges and sewer pipes — basics that are generally the responsibility of government agencies. But in a country of tall buildings, elevators are vital mobility aids, and they will become more important as the proportion of aging Canadians grows.
We need to know much more about the ups and downs of this industry.