Investigative research on the smooth operation and guidance of elevators used by people with difficulty moving stairs when evacuating from a fire

- Experiment on getting on and off an elevator -

Abstract

In Japan, evacuation by stairways is the principle method of evacuation during a fire, and it is an urgent issue from the viewpoints of universal design, SDGs, etc. to enable elevator evacuation for people who have difficulty in evacuating by stairways. Therefore, the authors have conducted various studies on the use of elevators to evacuate people who have difficulty in moving and evacuating by stairs in the event of fire. In this paper, the results and discussion of experiments on getting on and off an elevator with wheelchair users were reported. The changes in passenger flow and situations due to wheelchair users were investigated. As a result, the presence of wheelchair users slowed passenger flow and reduced the number of people who could enter the elevator. A questionnaire conducted after the experiment showed that the many participants did not think of getting off the elevator even if a wheelchair user was present. However, many participants were willing to their turn to a wheelchair user when they are waiting in the elevator hall.