Shortage of elevators in France
Before the 2024 Olympic and Paralympic Games, elevators were considered too old and too few.
Almost 8 in 10 French people said they used elevators regularly, and 28% even used them daily. The elevator is the country’s primary means of transportation, with 100 million trips per day. In the new survey conducted by the IPSOS institute on “The French and the Elevator,” the Elevator Federation revealed more about their relationship with vertical mobility. The observation was challenging.
In March 2024, the Elevator Federation presented the seventh edition of its “The French and the Elevator” barometer. This barometer highlighted French perceptions of the accessibility, necessity, and safety of elevators, both in public infrastructure and in residential buildings.
The elevator, an essential support for everyday mobility today… but especially tomorrow!
Considered by 57% of French people as indispensable for moving occasional loads, accompanying elderly people (53%) or small children (41%), elevators make everyday life easier, whether in urban areas, at the train station, in public places, or, of course, in condos.
This is without taking into account the increasingly important role this equipment will play in our future. Cities will have to become vertical and dense to accommodate more people in the same space. At the same time, the French population is aging and losing its autonomy. By 2030, one in three French people will be over 60 years old, and for the first time, there will be more people over 65 than those under 15. Accessibility and inclusive mobility must be a priority in urban areas; it is now necessary to think more carefully about vertical mobility and strengthen its network.
Insufficient Infrastructure in Public Spaces
While the challenges are well identified, the response is insufficient. As the Paris Olympic and Paralympic Games approached and accessibility issues increasingly occupied a prominent place in the political debate, the French highlighted the lack of elevators, escalators, or moving walkways in public transport (52%), in schools and universities (63%), and in sports centers (65%). This makes the daily lives of French people with disabilities very complex, not to mention the elderly and their families.
In fact, France currently lacks sufficient elevator facilities. It lags far behind its European neighbors. In fact, in France there are only eight elevators per 1,000 inhabitants, compared to 23 per 1,000 in Spain. Immediate accessibility is greatly underestimated in new construction.
Help is still needed
In this context, the Elevators Federation wanted to alert public authorities to the urgency of deploying more vertical mobility solutions in public places, but also to the need to support everyone in the maintenance and renovation of their equipment. This renovation was considered important and a priority by 94% of respondents, and with good reason: 50% of existing equipment is over 30 years old, and 25% is even over 40 years old.
To meet mobility and accessibility needs, after a certain age, it is essential to modernize elevators to ensure safety, reliability, and energy savings. Just as the French no longer use 4L and 2CV cars on their roads, they must renovate the elevators in their cities. Renewing appliances that are between 30 and 40 years old can save up to 60% of energy. Therefore, elevators play a fundamental role in decarbonizing our environment, emphasizes Philippe Boué, president of the Federation of Elevators.
Therefore, it would be essential to integrate elevators into the MaPrimeRénov and MaPrimeAdapt systems and open these systems to collective housing and public spaces. The Federation also calls for the release of other funds, such as the Île-de-France regional plan, which allocated €2 million to the renovation of elevators in co-owned buildings.
France: An Old and Poorly Maintained Elevator Park
And speaking of Rome, or rather, France, Radio France journalist Cecile Bidault sheds light on a surprisingly critical elevator situation that is unusual to find in a “First World” country.
There are elevators that violate the law.
On average, each elevator receives three calls a year for breakdowns of varying duration, sometimes lasting forever. On January 23, the Socialist group introduced a bill in the National Assembly, within its parliamentary niche, to require elevator operators to respond more quickly in the event of a breakdown.
“Some nights I have to carry the stroller, school bags, the shopping bag, and the baby”: Melissa, a mother of four, confesses to having spent “the worst months of her life.” In this ten-story private building located in Maisons-Alfort, in the Val-de-Marne, the elevator has been out of service since the summer. Therefore, for the past six months, she has been walking up and down seven floors several times a day.
She is a tenant, and despite her repeated inquiries to the owners and the building manager, she cannot find out when or if the elevator will be repaired.
“We can’t leave people who pay their bills in these situations.”
According to the Angry Elevators collective, which brings together a thousand citizens, there are 1.5 million elevator breakdowns each year. “An elevator breakdown changes lives completely,” says Noha Tefrit, president of the collective. Some elderly people fall down the stairs, and people who suffer from depression. We cannot leave those who pay their bills in these situations.
Noha Tefrit is also a parliamentary attaché for Philippe Brun, the Socialist MP who sponsored the bill that seeks to require elevator companies to intervene within two days, under penalty of a fine, and to have a stock of spare parts.
While awaiting a possible change in the law, there are systems to help people with mobility difficulties leave their homes. The company SAMV (Vertical Mobility Assistance Solution) offers an operator-operated stairlift. It’s a chair equipped with swivel wheels that goes up and down step by step.
“We once went up to the 23rd floor with a 130-kilogram person. We adapt a stair lift for tall buildings. We’re like society’s repairmen.”
There is trouble everywhere
The French channel TF1 INFO ran an investigation of residents with problems with their elevators.
Every night when she gets home, Jennifer, who uses a wheelchair, feels the same anxiety. “I never know if the elevator will work when I get back. It has happened at least four or five times that someone calls me before I get home to tell me the elevator is broken, and I am standing there thinking, ‘What do I do? I have to wait,'” she explains in the video at the top of the article.
Breakdowns occur in her building every week. One night, she even had to sleep at a neighbor’s house on the ground floor. “I don’t have access to the bathroom, I don’t have access to anything at all, so I’m trapped in their house,” this resident laments. Every time there is a breakdown, Jennifer calls her building manager, but she still does not know the reason for the malfunction.
The landlord of a real estate portfolio has identified the causes of the breakdowns in its 900 elevators. Two out of three cases are related to incivility or even vandalism, according to him. “For example, a door has been kicked down. And then you have to get a new door. Today, a door takes between six and eight weeks. That means the elevator will be down for six to eight weeks,” explains Karine Julien-Elkaim, president of Polylogis and member of the board of directors of Logirep.
The Federation of Elevators highlights the dilapidated state of the fleet. One in four elevators is over 40 years old. Replacing a part, finding it, is not so easy.”Elevator maintenance companies must manage spare parts inventories that span 40 years of technology.”
“It’s a mosaic of parts that require maintenance over a very long lifespan,” explains Alain Meslier, general delegate of the Federation of Elevators.
“When a technician is looking after 130 elevators, it’s difficult to dedicate a lot of time to each one.”
Parts that also need to be checked periodically to avoid breakdowns. We follow Antoine, a maintenance technician. For him, the solution is prevention.
For one of the elevators he oversees, his monthly visit lasts almost an hour, time to thoroughly check fifteen control points, including the operation of the buttons and the opening of the doors. “The more time we spend in the elevator, the more points we have to check. We have time to check them, adjust them, and perform preventive maintenance. Unfortunately, this is something technicians at large companies don’t have time for,” says Antoine Albernour, maintenance technician at Ascenseurs Syleam.
To win contracts, some maintenance companies do not hesitate to overwork their technicians. We met Jean, who worked for one of them for ten years. “They just pass on the addresses. It does not take long. Preventive maintenance, which is the basis of our work, is not performed. And that is why, inevitably, elevators break down more frequently. But when a technician has 130 devices, it’s hard to dedicate much time to each one,” he admits. In France, the law requires a maintenance visit every six weeks and a technical inspection every five years.
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* Report of the French Elevator Federation.
