Smart Lift / Using AI to Speed Up Elevators
Have you ever had this experience? Rushing to clock in for work, but the elevator in your office building takes forever, showing that it’s stopping on every floor; at the hospital, obviously a whole line of people is waiting, but the elevator only ever brings one car; at a department store, after finally waiting for the elevator, you find it’s already packed with people and strollers, and eventually you give up—pressing every button possible, even going in the wrong direction, just to get in.
The key reason behind all these problems is that the elevator only knows “someone wants to go up (or down)“—beyond that, it knows nothing. Lacking information, the elevator’s best strategy is one command, one action, and moreover, it can really only accept one command at a time, finishing the current one before looking at the next. Beyond that, the elevator doesn’t know how much space remains inside the car to accommodate passengers. While elevators are equipped with weight sensors, their purpose is to prevent overloading and accidents, not to precisely measure the effective space inside the car. For all these reasons, not only do more and more passengers pile up in the waiting lobby, but the elevator also keeps running in a low-efficiency state, unable to effectively complete the task of vertical transport.
A large amount of time cost hidden in unnecessary door opening and closing
Elevator speed is generally measured in meters per minute, with common speeds including 45, 60, 90, and even over 120. Taking a 60-meter-per-minute elevator as an example, assuming each floor is 4 meters high, running 5 floors would take 20 seconds. But in reality, the elevator needs far more than 20 seconds, because a typical elevator must execute a series of actions after receiving a command—opening the door, closing the door, accelerating, cruising, decelerating—and just the combination of opening and closing the door takes at least 6 seconds, accounting for at least 23% of the time cost for this trip.
Therefore, when an elevator can only make operational decisions based on the current command, the elevator doesn’t know “my car is already full, and no one wants to get off here, I should skip this floor” or “I know there are many people outside waiting for the elevator, and I alone am not enough—another elevator is needed.” As a result, overall operational efficiency can only continue to deteriorate until people give up on taking the elevator.
AI interpretation capability helps elevators make better decisions
The solution to this problem is quite intuitive: tell the elevator what’s happening inside and out, so the elevator can achieve better operating efficiency. Many years ago, we could still see beautiful elevator attendants overseeing elevator operation in certain places. Although we no longer see this today, we actually have a better option: using AI models trained specifically for elevator scenarios to serve us. For example, when AI detects that there’s no more space inside the elevator car, it can automatically skip a stop, avoiding ineffective waiting and door opening; it can also be used to detect the number of people in the waiting lobby, and when the number is too large, automatically dispatch another elevator to help, quickly relieving congestion.
Besides this real-time detection, AI can also help us track long-term operating conditions. By analyzing elevator usage data, we can build an operating strategy tailored specifically to the site. Such an operating strategy not only saves a significant amount of waiting time, but also saves the elevator’s running distance, actually saving consumed energy—and reducing running distance also means less wear and a longer service life.
Making good use of technology to reduce resource waste
In summary, through AI, elevators can obtain more complete environmental information and riding demand data, and based on this information, make better operating strategies and decisions—truly achieving efficiency and energy savings from the start. As human civilization continues to advance, a major challenge is how to continuously improve quality of life while gradually reducing waste, putting the earth’s precious resources to their best use. And in the costly endeavor of fighting gravity, AI will serve as a stable and affordable solution, keeping elevators on track with sustainability goals, continuing to provide the energy indispensable to urban life.