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PASSENGER ELEVATOR TRAFFIC PERFORMANCE IN

OFFICE BUILDING
Nazruddin bin Mat Ali
Department of Occupational Safety and Health, Malaysia
nazrudin@mohr.gov.my

Abstract

Elevators play major role in transportation system of a building and provide a great
deal of influence to the total function of a building, especially if the usage and
numbers of elevator is not properly planned. The lift shafts are not easily modified in
later stages of building development. Therefore the fundamental elevator design must
be planned at the very beginning. This paper attempts to analyse the performance of
elevator traffic in office buildings

Keywords: elevators, traffic analysis

INTRODUCTION

The objective of elevator traffic analysis is to find suitable elevators for a

building. It is a set of procedures for selecting the proper number, type, speed and
arrangement of elevators to satisfy the required service criteria. Traffic analysis can
be used to recommend a cost effective solution (but should not be used to guarantee
performance due to human / passenger factors). The discussion below looks into
issues pertaining the performance of elevator traffic in office buildings.

Two basic factors to be considered in elevator traffic analysis

1. Population; and
2. Traffic pattern.

Population of a building can be obtained from the using agency or figures

calculated based on typical occupancy for the floor area involved.

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There are various elevator traffic patterns:

1. Incoming peak / up-peak;
2. Outgoing peak/down-peak;
3. Two-way traffic;
4. Counter-flow traffic; and
5. Inter-floor traffic.

Usually performance criteria are the handling capacity and the interval
calculated in the up-peak situation. The up-peak situation is used since it is the most
demanding situation considering elevator handling capacity at least in office
buildings, and because there are analytical formulas for calculating the up-peak
handing capacity and interval.

According to Henri Hakonen, the best possibility to utilize the information,

and thus the biggest performance improvement, is achieved during up-peak traffic.
The morning up-peak traffic is usually the most difficult with respect to handling
capacity, so it is often adequate to plan the elevators according to that. In additional to
that, in government office buildings (single tenant) the up-peak pattern is very crucial
since the morning clock-in time is almost the same.

The application of different options also changes with the type of building
(residential, office, hotel, mixed purpose, special purpose), and different elevator
suppliers can offer different solutions. Any one of them could entail:

Elevators, escalators or moving walks;

Passenger, service, goods or other purpose elevators;

Single zoning or sub-zoning;

Direct elevatoring from the main entrance (including sky lobbies) fed by
express elevators from the main entrance;

Up/down elevatoring of local elevator groups from sky lobbies;

Single-deck, double-deck or triple-deck elevators;

Elevators with or without machine rooms;

Destination control or conventional control;

Elevators of the same group serving different floors;

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Handicapped requirements;

Special access and security requirements, etc.

29

Performance Measures

The following performance measures are used at the planning stage:

Handling capacity is the maximum number of passengers that can be transported

with an 80% load factor in up-peak within a certain time. The value is usually
given in persons per five minutes or percentage of population per five minutes.
The required handling capacity can be calculated according to the estimated
population, number of floors, floor heights and type of building.

Up-peak means an intense traffic situation, where passengers arrive at the

entrance floor and head to populated floors.

Round trip time for up-peak is the time required for an elevator to serve car calls
given from the entrance floor and the return back to the lobby. The round trip time
starts from the door opening at lobby and ends with door opening.

Interval is the average time between elevator departures from the entrance floor
during up-peak. It equals round-trip time divided by the number of elevators in the
group.

Waiting time (WT) is time between passenger arrival at the landing call floor and
entrance to the elevator.

Journey Time (JT) / Service Time is the total time from entering the waiting
area to exiting the elevator

Travel time is the elevator running time from the lowest served floor to the
highest served floor with nominal speed.

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Call time is the time required to serve a landing call, which is time between call
registration and cancellation. A call is cancelled when the elevator starts to
decelerate to the landing call floor.

Core area is the floor space taken up by the hoistways and waiting areas as the
elevators rise in the building.

Hall Call Registration Time is the time that elapses between registration of a hall
call and the arrival of the elevator.

ISSUES ON LIFT TRAFFIC PERFORMANCE

It is very important to know the suitability of elevators for a building. Traffic

analysis is only a set of procedures for predicting the proper number, type, speed and
arrangement of elevators. Traffic analysis can be used to recommend a cost effective
solution but should not be used to guarantee performance.

Real data

The predictability of mathematical models in this context relies on the

simplifying assumptions made about the passenger movement. Factors in the physical
environment are often not considered. With the real data, human characteristic can be
studied and use as an input data.

Data availabilities

In elevator systems, the use of the system waiting time is the priority objective
to attain an efficient system performance, at the same time as having a bounded
maximum waiting time. The system waiting time includes the waiting time for the lift
in the hall plus the trip time inside the lift. Also, other secondary criteria are used as
the queue sizes or the system energetic consumption.

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The waiting time data was not captured or monitored by the authority such as
Department of Occupational Safety and Health (DOSH). Even though every elevator
(except for domestic used) is required to obtain permission to install and Certificate of
Fitness from DOSH Head Quarter and DOSH State Office respectively. The
authorities are not controlling on the elevators traffic, but more on things that can
affect directly the safety, health and welfare of the elevators passengers (what was
written in the Act and Regulations).

Most of the building owners or the architects are depending on their

experience or to be based on lift supplier to provide the input parameters. Normally
the traffic analysis was keep by the elevators sales department as their sales
strategies. Since the authorities are not checking on the performance criteria, the
tendency of the elevator technical departments to follows what was agreed in the
written contract is very high. Beside the computer simulation, it is important to have a
real data as a reference and for cross validation; and also for improvement on the lift
system design.

Code / Owner Requirement

Most of the new buildings are high-rise; the progressive price increase in the
urban centres of the larger cities makes the necessary intensive ground exploitation by
means of the construction of high buildings.

Under the By-Law 124 and 243 (1), Uniform Building By-Laws, 1984, for all
non-residential buildings exceeding 4 storeys above or below the main access level at
least one lift shall be provided; and all building with the top occupied floor is over
than 18.5 meters above the fire appliance access level, fire lift shall be provided.

Different stakeholders involved in the planning phase emphasize different

criteria. Most of the criteria measurements are by nature uncertain.

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Cost

The floor area occupied by the elevator group consists of the shaft space and
the waiting area for passengers. In high-rise buildings the population is large and
distances are long, thus the portion of shafts is large compared to the total floor area.
This means more costs, since the rent-able area is reduced. It is very important to
determine the optimise number of the elevator, size, speed and other elevators
performance criteria.

The cost of an elevator system consists of initial cost, operational cost and
maintenance cost. The right elevators to the building can give high efficiency and cost
benefit; but it is also important to consider on downtime cost.

Passengers Satisfactoriness

One of the factors that can affect the value of a building is an elevator
performance. If the elevators performance is good, there will be less complaining
from the passengers / tenant / customer and the value of the building will be higher. A
proper study and update on the customer satisfactoriness such as their waiting time,
queue and journey time is very important especially during peak time.

The elevator safety is indirectly depending on the elevators performance. If

the elevator performance is bad, there will be a high tendency of vandalism. This
could cause higher maintenance and downtime cost; and it also could cause mantrap
and accident to the passengers.

Putrajaya is a planned city and a Federal Territory that acts as a federal

government administration centre of Malaysia moved from the overcrowding and
congestion of Kuala Lumpur. There are new office complexes and it is important to
study on the elevator traffic performance of the new government buildings.

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RECOMMENDATIONS

For a better performance, we have to consider all the factors that can
contribute for the better performance and to avoid the factors that can affect the
performance of the lifts.

Factors that can contribute for a better performance are:

Provide only one main entrance (can use escalator or other lift such as carpark lift to main entrance)

Proper lobby arrangement

Maximum 8 cars per group

Wider car door for easy excess.

Factors that we have to avoid (if possible) are:

Having eating facility on an upper floor,

Having public areas (banking hall, ballroom, stock trading floor, etc.) on an
upper floors,

Multiple lobby floors, and

Passenger elevators serving car park floors above the main lobby.

Dedicated lift for VVIP should be considered from the earlier stage. Taken one lift
from the grouping can affect the whole lifts performance.

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Figures for comparisons

Table 1 - 6 illustrate some of the characteristics of lift performance for the purpose of
comparisons.

Table 1: Estimation of Building Population by CIBSE Guide D

Building Type
Office (Multi tenancy)
-Regular
-Prestige
Office (Single tenancy)
-Regular
-Prestige

Estimate Population
10-12 m net area/person
15-18 m net area/person

8-10 m net area/person

12-20 m net area/person

Table 2: 5-Minute Handling Capacity by CIBSE Guide D

Building Type

Handling Capacity (%)

Office (Multi tenancy)

-Regular

11 15

-Prestige

15 17

Office (Single tenancy)

-Regular

15

-Prestige

15 17

Table 3: Estimate Interval Time by CIBSE Guide D

Building Type

Interval Time (sec.)

Office (Multi tenancy)

-Regular

25 30

-Prestige

20 25

Office (Single tenancy)

-Regular

25 30

-Prestige

20 25

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Table 4: Probable Interval in Office Buildings by CIBSE Guide D

Interval (sec.)

Quality of service

20

Excellent

25

Very Good

30

Good

40

Poor

50

Unsatisfactory

Table 5: Elevator Traffic Analysis: Summary of Recommendations

KEY

TYPES OF BUILDING

FACTORS
Population

Office Buildings

Floor area

Number of rooms

Morning up:

Morning down

normally prime

Evening two-

determinant

way: normally

Noon two-way

prime

Evening down

determinant

30 sec intervals

20-25 sec waiting

Traffic Conditions

Quality of Service

times

150 sec system

service time

Quality of Service

Hotels

10%-15% up
handling capacity

35-45 sec

Apartments

bedrooms

Two-way

45-90 sec

intervals

25-30 sec waiting

intervals

time

180 sec system

6%-9% two-way
handling capacity

30-60 sec
waiting time

service time

Number of

240 sec system

service time

5% two-way
handling
capacity

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Table 6: Goal and its Value

Goal
Categories of Buildings

5-Minute Lift
Capacity

General conditions of
Used exclusively by

location

one company

Vicinity of subway and

electrical railway

Office Building

General conditions of
Partially exclusive

location

use

Vicinity of subway and

electric railway
General conditions of

Government office

location
Vicinity of subway and
electric railway
Room lease, block
lease

Leased office

Floor lease

Hotel

Middle & high class hotels

Average
Operation
Interval

20-30%

23-25%

16-18%

Bellow 30
seconds, but in

18-20%

case of
sufficient

14-16%

capacity, 30-40
seconds is

16-18%

allowed.

11-13%
13-15%

40

10%
Below

Business hotel

Apartment, mansion

7%

3-5%

sec.
50
sec.

Below 40 sec.

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REFERENCES
Barney G. C., dos Santos S.M., Elevator Traffic Analysis, Design and Control,
Peter Peregrinus Ltd., London, (1985).

George

Strakosch.

Vertical

Transportation,

2nd

Edition.

(New

York:

Albertson)(1982).

George R. Strakosch. The Vertical Transportation Handbook Third Edition. (New

York: John Wiley & Sons)(1998).

Henri Hakonen, Simulation of Building Traffic and Evacuation by Elevators,

(Licentiate Thesis, Helsinki University of Technology, Department of
Engineering Physics and Mathematics, Systems Analysis Laboratory) (2003).

Ir. Ong Ching Loon. A Report On One-Day Seminar On Vertical Transportation.

(JURUTERA)(April 2004).

Jrg Lauener ,Traffic Performance of Elevators with Destination Control,

(ELEVATOR WORLD) (September 2007).

Mark Duckworth. Galaxy Elevator Control Installation and Adjustment.

(ELEVATOR WORLD) (March 2002).

Roger Greeno. Building Services, Technology and Design. (England: Pearson

Education Limited)(1997).

U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, Technical Instructions Elevator Systems,

Washington, DC (1998).

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