In: Automatic elevators

Over the weekend, I went downtown and experienced a different kind of elevator.

Usually, when you use the elevator, you press a button on the wall to call for an unused car. Usually the most complicated this interaction gets is you specify whether you wish to go up or down. However, in this elevator bay of 6 elevator doors, there was no button(s) on the wall.

A different user journey

Instead, I was greeted by this panel. A touch-screen, not a tactile button. As you can see, it’s not even a fancy way to “upgrade” the up/down buttons. Instead, it takes what you normally see inside the elevator and brings it outside: it prompts you to select the floor you desire.

Once I had done that, the screen shifted and told me which number elevator I needed to wait for. Elevator 5. When Elevator 5 chimed and opened, I got inside to a mostly button-less elevator interior (pictured) and was deposited on the floor I had selected on the panel.

Pretty streamlined! A single interaction instead of two.

My initial reaction

Here’s the thing… I kind of liked it.

But after talking to a few coworkers and looking at some comments online, it seems the opinions on this process flow are pretty polarizing.

It makes sense. It’s completely different. Maybe that’s why I admire it. When tech advances, sometimes we’re able to rethink our mental models and get an efficiency win.

The old way versus the new

How did elevators evolve? Well, I don’t know enough to go way back, but I know we used to have elevator operators, people who would stand inside the elevator and make sure the elevator went where it should. That was phased out; buttons replaced them. And now, why not these screens?

Here are things I like about the new way:

• As I said, it reduces a two-input process to a single input.

• It maps more closely to my mental model. I’m often thinking about what floor I want when approaching the elevator bay. The decision of “up or down?” is more relative, not empirical.

• I don’t have to swivel and watch all elevators, waiting for the right one to chime. I’m given clear direction of where to look.

• Once inside, I don’t have to worry about finding buttons, trying to press buttons around people, asking them to press the button for me, etc. I just ride to my floor. The process is more unconscious.

Of course, I wonder what would happen if there were many people using the elevators. Would there be longer lines? Is it only one elevator to a floor? If multiple floors are being loaded into the same elevator, would it create more mistakes with people exiting on the wrong floor?

The verdict

In. I like it overall.

Ideas for improvement

Here’s one idea for improvement: a screen inside the elevator that would let you override the floor you initially chose. Elevators, as we have them now, already allow for this with buttons. I’d hate to force a user to exit the elevator just to correct the mistake.

Another idea for improvement: make it more tactile. In my opinion, tactile is better. (Eventually I need to write up a post explaining why.) Below, you can see a picture of the same experience but with tactile buttons.