Any new building that rises more than three stories (or is it three?) above the ground has to include an elevator. The government provides incentives to add elevators to existing buildings. Almost all mulrtistory residential buildings are condos (although often the apartments are rented out), and the house committee has to arrange the retrofit. Even more difficult is placing the elevator shaft.
Jerusalem is home to lots of old people. We see them walking with their caretakers, canes, and walkers. They must have a hard time with the stairs home.
Starwells are too narrow to contain the tiny elevators that rise between stairs in European buildings. Owners are reluctant to have an elevator close off windows or shroten balonies.
But here and there you can see a tower, perhaps at a corner, of an older building. The style of the stonework facing indicates that this is an add-on.
In 2006 we lived in a building with an added elevator, buit it went only to the apartment that occupied the entire top floor. Thatflat's owners had paid the families below them to allow them to add the elevator. I'd guess those lower families could now pay the upper dwellers to add entries on the 2nd amd third )counting American) floors. There'd be no advantage to the ground floor flat, though.
The entrance to that building was tenn stairs or so above the street, so even with the elevator, the housing was not handicapped-accessible.
Copyright 2017 Jane S. Fox
Labels: architecture, elevator, walking
