A short history of the elevator

At the time, elevators were more of a tourist attraction than a means of transportation. The world had no tall buildings yet, and lower floors were the most desirable because they didn’t require you to climb many stairs. The higher the floor, the lower the rent.

But the elevator would change that completely, ushering in the era of the skyscraper and transforming the social and architectural landscape of the modern city.

A tale of two Otis

Although this event is often heralded as the turning point in elevator history, its relevance may have been inflated by the subsequent success of the Otis Elevator Company, today’s largest manufacturer of vertical elevators. “If Ford were the only motor company to survive the early 20th century, we would attribute the origin of the modern car to Ford rather than looking at the complex story that it is,” said Gray. The concept of the modern elevator was in fact borne out of two converging ideas, each with its own strengths.

The first patent for a “vertical railway” was filed in 1859 by Otis Tufts, a coincidentally named engineer whose design — which debuted the same year within New York’s Fifth Avenue Hotel — included an actual car with a bench inside, where people could sit. Elisha Otis’ elevator, on the other hand, had nothing but a platform and was patented later, in 1861. But crucially, it included his safety brake, which increased the public’s acceptance of elevators to the point that it became a standard.

“All modern elevator safety devices are predicated on the same idea. The difference is that today they’re based on speed. If an elevator car exceeds a preset safe speed, the safety activates to bring it to a stop in the shaft,” said Gray.

Ascending rooms

The first elevators didn’t sell well because they were expensive, but found some initial success as luxury items in hotels in New York, London and Paris. “They were beautifully designed rooms with upholstered seats and mirrors on the walls, sometimes even a small chandelier hanging down from the center of the car,” said Gray. They often were called “ascending room” or “upstairs omnibus,” borrowing words from other transportation systems.

Engraving depicting the elevator in the Lord and Taylor Department Store, Manhattan, 1873. Credit: Archive Photos/Archive Photos/Getty Images

They were all powered by steam engines and therefore slow. “The elevator operator would close the door and then the car would rise very slowly. It was not about speed. It was about an amazing new technology and a luxurious experience that allowed guests to avoid walking up the stairs,” said Gray.

“When we make the shift from hotels to commercial buildings, the steam engine disappears because it’s too slow. Instead, we get innovative hydraulic elevators that can go faster and are easier to maintain,” said Gray. The industry standard for the ideal response time of an elevator — no more than 30 seconds — was established in these years, and remains the same today.

Exterior of the Home Insurance Building, Chicago. The building was demolished in 1931. Credit: Chicago History Museum / Contributor

The penthouse

A further push came from the switch from hydraulics to electric engines. “The technological changes are directly tied to the desire to go higher and higher. What’s known as the modern electric traction elevator was developed in the first two decades of the 20th century, and it remains the industry standard to this day,” said Gray.

Safer than the stairs

Taller buildings have made elevator engineering more complicated. The first problem is that a significant portion of the building’s footprint needs to be reserved for the shafts, but there are also limits to what can be accomplished. The world’s tallest building, the Burj Kalifa in Dubai, has just 57 elevators (16 fewer than the Empire State Building, which is half as tall), but none of them can travel to all 160 floors: they are instead designed as express lines that serve different sections of the tower.

When designing lifts for what could become the next tallest skyscraper in the world, the Kingdom Tower in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia, elevator maker Kone wanted a record-breaking shaft running the full height of the tower, projected to be one kilometer (3,280 feet) tall. To do so, it had to come up with an entirely new type of cable made of carbon fiber, because conventional steel ones would be too heavy and jam up.

Where do you stand?

Shutterstock

Why is it often awkward to ride in a packed elevator? Elevator etiquette is extremely variable throughout different times and different cultures, but a universal trait is that we don’t like to stand too close to strangers, which is why most people tend to maximize their personal space once inside an elevator car.

“If you’re alone in the elevator you stand in the center, because it’s your space and you control it. If someone else enters, you move to a corner or to a side,” said Grey.

Cognitive science researcher Rebekah Rousi conducted a study in which she observed elevator use in an office building in Australia, and noted that men and women behaved differently: “Older, perhaps more senior professional men traveled towards the back of the cabin, while women were towards the front. Women were less hesitant to look in mirrors while other people of any gender were traveling in the elevator, and more likely to look at the floor,” she said in an email.

Individual patterns can be suppressed by cultural norms. For example, Rousi says, in Japan, a highly hierarchical society, junior staff will let more senior staff into the elevator first, and then press the button for them.

Ultimately, elevators present a unique social construct. “There aren’t too many places in which you find yourself so tightly confined, with people you may not know, traveling to tremendous heights and down again,” said Rousi.

Ropeless future

Among the obvious changes that elevators have brought to the world, Gray highlights two underrated ones. “First, there’s no question that they have proved incredibly helpful to anyone who has difficulty moving due to disabilities. Second, until the 1950s almost all elevators had operators who were required to guide the car on its journey, as they didn’t automatically stop level with the floors. This provided a variety of employment opportunities in many cities,” he said.

A Paternoster elevator in the city hall of Stuttgart, Germany, in 2015. Credit: picture alliance/picture alliance/picture alliance via Getty Image