For a six-story residential building, an elevator is necessary so that egress and ingress by occupants are more convenient and faster. One such condominium in Jiangsu province in eastern China only has stairs, so residents decided to have an elevator installed.
However, they could not afford the 500,000 yuan cost of a standard elevator, so they opted for a modified version instead.
A video of the elevator shared on Chinese social media went viral as it stopped on only one floor. For 200,000 yuan, no elevator exits were built on five of the building’s six floors.
The elevator stops only between the fifth and sixth floors, and residents on lower levels must use the stairs from there to reach their units, the South China Morning Post reported.
Meanwhile, a high-rise resident who could not access an elevator found another way to get down the building on 1 April.
The woman, who lives on the 27th floor of a condominium in Beijing, accidentally locked herself in her bedroom and could not call for help because her mobile phone was in the living room.
Moments later, a cleaner and a security guard saw the elderly woman clinging to the railings of a cage protecting air conditioners on the outer wall of the building, according to the report. They called for help and shouted to the 89-year-old woman not to move.
However, she continued climbing down from the 26th floor before firefighters arrived. She became exhausted upon reaching the air conditioner cage on the 21st floor and stopped.
Rescuers then reached her from inside the building and pulled her to safety. The octogenarian suffered only fatigue and was otherwise unharmed.
Her ordeal went viral online, garnering over 4 million views on social media, according to the report.