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Attention All Energy Expenders (i.e.: humans as a general rule)
Brace yourselves: the elevator at the condo I live in recently broke down. Horror of horrors! While this wasn’t much of an issue for me- the stairs and I have quite a friendly relationship- I know that there are countless people who choose elevators and escalators over the stairs every day when their feet are perfectly capable of carrying them up a couple flights of stairs.
Granted, of course, I do live on the sixth floor. And I must assume that if I lived on, say, the fifteenth floor, I’d be much less enthusiastic about walking up and down those stairs several times a day. Be that as it may, I’m always a little curious when I get on the elevator with someone else and they get off on the second or third floor. I can understand if you are carrying something that it would be awkward to walk a flight or two of stairs, but if your arms are empty, is it really necessary to use up an elevators energy when you could walk up the stairs instead? Most of the time, the elevator is slow and takes so long to get to the ground level that you could easily have walked up the stairs and arrived at your door earlier or at the same time that you would have gotten there had you used the elevator.
The University of Winnipeg is famous for the three escalators that grace Centennial Hall. They are narrow, fast paced escalators; on any given day at the university, you will find students and faculty alike packed onto those escalators. But even though they are so fast, it’s not very difficult to walk up the stairs at the same speed as the people travelling via escalator. Just three flights of stairs. And considering that the University of Winnipeg is equally well-known for the fact that the vast majority of its students have a reputation for being Left-wing and “urban hippies”, that’s slightly hypocritical. These are such small, simple changes that we can make; minor adjustments in our everyday lifestyle. So why is it so hard for us?
Escalators and elevators use more energy with the more people that they carry. Yes, they are continually running, but that doesn’t mean that they expend the same amount of energy all the time. With the extra weight of people stepping onto them, that uses up more precious energy. It really seems like an incredible waste, when we could be using that energy ourselves. I understand the reason behind elevators for reaching the highest floors in buildings, and the necessity for people who have difficulties walking or are carrying things, but what about the rest of society? The people who live on the first 5 floors (might as well be generous) or so? Surely we are capable of moving our bodies up a few stairs?
With all of this technology doing things for us, it’s no wonder that society as a whole is having more and more health problems. We don’t move like we used to: cars, buses, taxis, elevators, and escalators are at our dispense. In between the daily travelling, most of us come to a desk to sit down comfortably for several hours. At the end of the day, our machinery does the work of carrying us home, and then we plop down on the couch, exhausted after a long day. Here’s an idea: if you can reasonably wake up a little earlier to walk or bike to work, or if you can use stairs instead of the elevator, or if you can walk ten minutes to the bus stop beyond the one that is closest to you, maybe you’ll find that the little bit of exercise actually gives you energy rather than tires you out. You won’t feel quite so exhausted by the end of the day, and your alertness will likely make for a more cheerful attitude (and a more productive workday).
That’s my challenge to you. Try it, just for a few days. See if it makes a difference to you. And even if you don’t find that it adds to your energy reserve (which would frankly surprise me), I’m sure you’ll find that it will add to the environments energy reserve by not expending it on yourself. Canada has been ranked as one of the top countries for contributing to negative climate changes (The Winnipeg Free Press, 07/12/07. You can read the whole article here), even though we encourage other countries to make green changes. Instead of taking that information and feeling embarrassed or shameful of it, we should view it as an opportunity to lower that ranking and set a good example for the global community.
The environment can appreciate it if we all take a couple of steps rather than pushing a button. It’s the difference between shallow ecology and deep ecology. After all, this is the season for giving: why not give back to the environment?
Sagan Morrow is currently studying Rhetoric at the University of Winnipeg. She writes a health and wellness blog and is the Living Well columnist at The Uniter. Read more by Sagan Morrow.
Hello there, I am usually annoyed with people clambering up and down those escalators. Although, usually when I use them, they are empty. I walk up the escalators as opposed to riding them like most people you’d see on them. It isn’t a carnival ride. It’s a convenience.
To walk up the stairs would be in fact slower than walking the escalator. As long as you do not stand motionless on there that is. Now, I can agree that the energy consumption isn’t exactly “necessary”. But what convenience these days is? Most things. I’m sure if everyone took a good look at the conveniences that are needless we would have a lot less in our lives. Take cars for example. One could apply the same method of thinking to riding a vehicle. Don’t get me wrong, I’m not trying to say that you should start taking the escalator at University. But answer me this: Do you ride a car? how often?
#1. Posted by Gabe on January 16th 2008 at 3:52pm
Yes, I do occasionally ride in cars, but very seldom. I walk to and from work, school, the mall, most of my friends houses, and really whenever possible. If I’m leaving the city or travelling to the suburbs I’ll take a car, but it’s not too often I do that. I don’t mind the slight extra amount of time it takes to walk from one place to the next- although, you’re right. I do live in Osborne Village so most places that I need to be are within about an hour walking distance, and other people might not be so lucky.
#2. Posted by Sagan on April 21st 2008 at 5:18am
Well also, I would mention that a lot of people do many things for their convenience, as is the motto of the age we live in. Now I’m not a guy who minds a walk but in the end I believe that in reality, it’s such a minor amount of energy expended, (electric I mean) that it is for the most part, negligible. Not to try to claim that your post is inaccurate, but I believe the truth is that there are thousands upon thousands of things people do that are so much more detrimental to the world than escalators.
Watching movies at home, not eating at a restaurant, and instead cooking at home, owning multiple computers are all energy consuming actions that are convenient, that people will not give up. Will you? These actions also, I might add, consume much more electricity per year than escalators. And this is also not even considering the ridiculous amount of energy expended on things that people actually have no idea about. Like processing food. Everyone eats food, and it consumes heinous amounts of energy to produce, unless you’re maybe buying from a farm directly. The thing is that everyone living today in north america is under the severe hold of “convenience”. To claim that making less consumption by such a minute amount is something to be noticed is similar to saying that we could have saved an entire forest, but it was only convenient to save this small shrub, so we should understand that this is better. When in fact, the real problem doesn’t lie in the reduction of minor conveniences, but the bigger problems, and I don’t even need to get into those.
Ideally, we could convince people en masse, to try to be less “convenient”, but the truth is that even that action of trying to open people’s eyes is actually, in fact, quite inconvenient.
#3. Posted by Gabe on September 15th 2008 at 1:35pm
Yes but there are other conveniences that people could do very well without, and have done so in the past that could be done away with, let me ask you, do you live alone? If not, do you and your family/roomate all share the same computer? Is there more than 1 television in your house? How often do you cook at your house? These are all things that could be dealt with, quite realistically but go unchecked. They are a small change that one could adapt to quite easily, and in the end, if people did it, would actually make a HUGE difference.
Now, if someone as passionate as you about this sort of stuff is willing to write about it to try and spread the word but is not willing to try the other minor changes to make a difference, what hope do we really have for the general public to go out of their way at all?
#4. Posted by Gabe on September 16th 2008 at 7:12am
You raise some really valid points which I agree with. However, my point is exactly what you have mentioned: the examples that you bring up do cost a lot more energy than something as simple as taking the stairs instead of an escalator, but the majority of our society is not willing to take those steps and make the big changes. This is why it makes sense to make small changes that we won’t even notice from day to day.
Also, something to take into consideration is that if you ride the escalator several times a day for a year, and then the next year you don’t take it at all, you would be saving a lot of energy over the course of that year. Small changes do count and they can make a big difference when the big changes seem to be too much. It is better to make the small changes than to make no changes at all.
#5. Posted by Sagan on September 17th 2008 at 10:34am
Now there’s a depressing thought, that the general public wouldn’t want to make any changes at all!
And that is really the whole point of my writing this. There’s always going to be minor changes that we are not willing to make. However, there’s also always going to be minor changes that won’t make us have to go out of our way to accomplish but will realistically make a huge difference in the long run. I am suggesting that we all try to make one small feasible change and go from there.
And to answer your questions: I live with one other roommate; we each have a laptop; we have one tv; and we try to always eat at home and buy food from the grocery store to cook in the kitchen. We do our best to save energy when we can but obviously we still indulge in luxuries- and that’s all I’m asking for. Just one tiny change. It’s all about the little baby steps.
#6. Posted by Sagan on September 18th 2008 at 11:11am