The Messy Science of Escalator Etiquette

0:00 Picture this.

0:01 You're walking up an escalator, maybe at a train station.

0:04 You get halfway up and some bozo is

0:06 standing on the walking side blocking your way.

0:08 So, you breathe down their neck, hoping they'll let you pass, but they don't.

0:11 So, you go up the rest of the escalator in slow motion.

0:14 It's pretty common.

0:14 Some of you might be doing that right now.

0:17 But if you find that situation frustrating, consider this.

0:19 In many cases, you, the noble walker trying to get

0:23 up your side of the escalator, are the problem.

0:25 That's because at key [music] times, standard escalator etiquette,

0:29 stand on one side, walk on the other, doesn't serve us at all.

0:32 In fact, if everyone stood, it would be apparently faster for everyone involved.

0:37 So why do we never do it?

0:38 After all, stand on one side,

0:40 walk on the other is one of few seemingly universal laws.

0:43 In most places like the US, Canada, China, the UK, France,

0:46 and parts [music] of Japan,

0:47 the standards are on the right and walkers on the left.

0:50 Some places like Australia, Singapore,

0:52 and the [music] other parts of Japan flip it with people standing on the left.

0:56 Side fact, we do actually know why people walk

0:58 on the left rather than the right, at least in London.

1:01 Nowadays, both these standing and walking people step

1:03 off and walk forward over that little Comey thing.

1:06 But back in the early days of London escalators,

1:08 they didn't have those stripey stairs and combed endings that ease

1:11 you off today's modern escalator and or devour your crocs.

1:14 Instead, they had a rather abrupt end where

1:16 the flat steps slotted back into the floor.

1:18 To avoid you walking into that, escalators ended with what were called shunts,

1:22 or diagonal-shaped obstacles that force you to offload on the left side.

1:26 This is how the left became the walking side.

1:28 It made more efficient traffic flow,

1:29 allowing faster moving walkers to exit via the inside corner rather than having

1:33 to cross over standard who were riding motionless to the end of the shunt.

1:37 Shunt escalators all got replaced in the 1920s, but old habits die hard,

1:40 or in this case, do not die at all.

1:42 So that's why Londoners walk on the left and then Australians walk on the right

1:46 because of I assume the same reasons their toilets swirl the other way.

1:49 A lot of the most efficient studies of escalator etiquette and specifically

1:52 how it impacts escalator efficiency have

1:54 been done on the postshunt London underground.

1:57 [music] And one of the main ones was this from 2002.

2:00 At the time there were 49 escalators across the tube and the researchers

2:04 wanted to figure out their maximum capacity at peak parts of the day.

2:07 They only focused on up escalators since you

2:09 see the most crowding as a train empties out

2:12 and everyone [music] all at once is trying

2:13 to scurry up to the surface to exit the station.

2:16 They also only studied the busiest escalators

2:18 at 10 of the busiest stations in central London.

2:20 And one of the most interesting or at least halfinter interesting things they

2:23 found was that escalator etiquette is more

2:26 than just stand [music] right, walk left.

2:28 For example, they read about how on the standing side of the escalator,

2:31 people tend to leave a one-step gap between themselves

2:34 and the person in front of them as a personal space thing.

2:36 Of course, this means that a 100 step escalator would seldom,

2:40 even in peak travel times, have 100 people standing on the right side.

2:43 It would be about 50.

2:45 On the walking side, people spread out even more.

2:47 That's because you take up more space when you're walking.

2:50 In addition to your usual body, you've got a foot out in front of you

2:53 and frequently a foot a little bit behind you.

2:55 To adjust for this, escalator walkers tend to leave a two-step

2:58 gap between themselves and the person in front of them.

3:00 So at a given time on our 100 step escalator,

3:03 the walking side would have 33 people and a third.

3:07 But of course, we're not dealing with a single moment.

3:09 We're dealing with flow.

3:11 And our 33 and a3 walkers are moving faster than our 50 standers.

3:14 The 2002 researchers found that on a normal

3:17 speed tube escalator of normal height in busy times,

3:20 the standing side of the escalator will have

3:21 a capacity of about 54 passengers per minute,

3:24 while the walking side will have about 66 passengers per minute.

3:28 By that math, it would appear that the actual most

3:30 efficient thing would be to have people walk on both sides.

3:33 But of course, that is never going to happen.

3:35 There's already an escalator where people walk on both sides.

3:38 It's called the stairs, and we all hate it.

3:41 Here's the trouble, though.

3:42 The walking side is only helping the escalator be more efficient if

3:45 enough of the people trying to board the escalator decide to walk it.

3:48 This is intuitive if you imagine the extremes.

3:51 Picture an escalator that only goes up 4 ft,

3:53 not even up to most people's eye level.

3:55 Obviously, the way to get the most people through this escalator

3:58 in a given time is to have people walk on both sides.

4:01 I'm sure many would.

4:02 It's about four or [music] five steps.

4:04 But now imagine an escalator that's 200 ft tall,

4:07 the height of a 20story building.

4:09 Obviously, nobody would walk it.

4:11 I mean, one or two freaks would,

4:12 but not enough to justify seating half the escalator space to them.

4:16 No.

4:16 To maximize throughput here, you naturally have people stand on both sides,

4:20 one person on every step.

4:22 So, at what escalator height does dedicating

4:24 half the space to walkers hurt your throughput?

4:27 And the answer per that study is 18.43 m or about 60 ft?

4:32 Any taller [music] than that and having a fast lane is making

4:34 your escalator less efficient because not enough people are going to walk it.

4:37 So, you'd move masses faster with two [music] standing sides.

4:40 Below that height, walking on one side is fine.

4:43 We don't need double standing to optimize the escalator in the mall.

4:46 But in transit systems, 60 plus foot escalators aren't that uncommon.

4:50 Take for example the new Elizabeth line on the underground.

4:53 Every escalator built to service is at least [music] 60 ft.

4:56 Its tallest escalator is 60 m.

4:59 And it's not even the tallest in the system.

5:01 And it's not just London.

5:02 Transit systems from New York to DC to Amsterdam to St.

5:05 Petersburg to Istanbul to Tokyo to Seoul to Bangkok to Delhi to Melbourne

5:10 and Medí and tons of others all have 60 plus foot escalators somewhere.

5:15 More London Underground studies followed the 2002 one.

5:18 One at Canary War found that double standing didn't help capacity,

5:21 though that escalator was only 10 meters long,

5:23 so it didn't really disagree with the original findings.

5:25 Other studies had basically the same results, and maximum busyiness,

5:29 standing on both sides of a tall enough tube escalator gets more people up

5:32 it faster than having people stand on the right and walk on the left.

5:36 But while there's ample research and real world evidence

5:38 for the double standing increases capacity on tall escalators thing,

5:42 there's more evidence for a greater truth

5:44 that there is nothing you can do or say

5:46 that will make people stop standing on one

5:48 side and [music] walking on the other.

5:49 Many cities motivated by either the capacity thing or the wisdom that you

5:53 see fewer escalator injuries from standing

5:55 users have tried to change the etiquette.

5:57 In Toronto, that just [music] meant removing signage

6:00 that reinforced the stand here, walk there thing.

6:03 In Hong Kong, they employed escalator

6:04 safety ambassadors to advocate standing still.

6:07 And in London, in service of some of these studies,

6:09 they had people and recorded announcements telling

6:11 everyone explicitly to stand on both sides.

6:14 And by and large, in every [music] case, they just wouldn't do it.

6:19 That's even one of the conclusions of the 2002 study.

6:21 The author said that while double

6:23 standing does give some efficiency gains, quote,

6:25 "No attempt should be made to persuade passengers

6:27 to stand on both sides of an escalator.

6:29 Such a policy would only be advantageous at a limited number

6:32 of escalators and would in any case be [music] very difficult to enforce.

6:35 So, it looks like escalator etiquette is here to stay.

6:38 But hey, maybe if you're on one of those really

6:40 long ones and standing on the walking side,

6:41 you could show this video to the person

6:43 behind you and they won't be mad anymore.

6:45 Worth a try.

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