That isn't proof that people are lazy, it's proof that they walk around in a trance.

Yeah I don't see how this means they're lazy.

The worst part about the video are the people just standing there, especially on the down escalator.

JerseyTim: The worst part about the video are the people just standing there, especially on the down escalator.

I thought I was the only one who walked up the escalator. It's just stairs that move, why not use them like stairs?

/please excuse the convenience

I love mob mentality and crowd theory.

I used to go to White Sox games a lot. It seems everyone would try to enter at the gate nearest to the parking lots.

Line of 100 people.

No one except me knew the gate 100 feet away, around the corner always had a line of like 10 people.

Mullet dude gave considerable thought as to which escalator to ride.

"Should I assert my own individuality or should I conform. Mmmmmmmm, what to do?"

In the end, he decided to conform. Sometimes you sheeple are sooooo predictable.

We have become nothing more then herds of cattle.

My personal favorite - I was at the mall with my wife. The escalators weren't working. An older couple kept pacing around the bottom, looking nervous and confused. My wife and I walked over (we needed to go upstairs).

The older lady pointed at the escalators and said, "Excuse me, but do these go up?"

My wife said, "Yes, they do." And we proceeded to walk up the escalator to the second level.

The old folks stayed below, still looking confused.

Maybe there's a rule: Riders right, Walkers left. I'm merely speculating.

It happens with a row of doors to. Everyone goes in or out one open door

downstairs: I love mob mentality and crowd theory.

I used to go to White Sox games a lot. It seems everyone would try to enter at the gate nearest to the parking lots.

Line of 100 people.

No one except me knew the gate 100 feet away, around the corner always had a line of like 10 people.

In you story, there were at least 10 other people who knew about it, and you said that you were the only person who knew, so I don't know if I can believe you.

The first person to get on that one was crop-dusting everyone else the entire way up.

Enjoy.

downstairs: I love mob mentality and crowd theory.

I used to go to White Sox games a lot. It seems everyone would try to enter at the gate nearest to the parking lots.

Line of 100 people.

No one except me knew the gate 100 feet away, around the corner always had a line of like 10 people.

I went into a department store one time and attempted to try on a pair of pants. The department I got them from had a huge line at the fitting rooms, but the next department over was completely empty.

/The best part was finding the empty fitting room right after the people standing in line made fun of me for not realizing there was a line.

Vance Uppercut: In you story, there were at least 10 other people who knew about it, and you said that you were the only person who knew, so I don't know if I can believe you.

Haha, you got me.

I meant no one in the long line. Because I was in it, and realized... hey, people are idiots. I bet I can find a shorter one.

cig-mkr: We have become nothing more then herds of cattle.

No, we always were. Humans are animals and always will be, we think we're so smart and better than everything else on this earth but at the end of the day we behave just like any other animal. People who point to such phenomena as a "sign of the times" or how society have devolved are mistaken.

CommieTaoist: cig-mkr: We have become nothing more then herds of cattle.

No, we always were. Humans are animals and always will be, we think we're so smart and better than everything else on this earth but at the end of the day we behave just like any other animal. People who point to such phenomena as a "sign of the times" or how society have devolved are mistaken.

So much this. The herd instinct is strong in us

Uh, stand on the right, walk on the left.

Are you people that dim?

Did anyone point out to subby yet that this in no way constitutes laziness? Oh, good.

While you can all here pass judgement and say "crowd mentality". I suspect that our information might be incomplete. We don't know what is on top of the stairs.. maybe it is much more convenient to take the right one due do some obstacle or entrance at the top that the users of the escalator are familiar with.

We don't have enough info.

dogboy360: It happens with a row of doors to. Everyone goes in or out one open door

I absolutely hate when I go into a retail store and they only unlock one of the double doors at the entrance. I go in the left door, and when I leave the door on the left is locked, and everyone is forced to use the one door, coming or going. Too damn lazy to flip up 2 levers to unlock both doors.

Silicon Sam: dogboy360: It happens with a row of doors to. Everyone goes in or out one open door

I absolutely hate when I go into a retail store and they only unlock one of the double doors at the entrance. I go in the left door, and when I leave the door on the left is locked, and everyone is forced to use the one door, coming or going. Too damn lazy to flip up 2 levers to unlock both doors.


I don't unlock my double doors.
First, I'm the only one there and have to lock up the office to take care of things on the property often (Self-storage facility).
Second, it amuses me to watch people run into the locked door.

downstairs: I love mob mentality and crowd theory.

I used to go to White Sox games a lot. It seems everyone would try to enter at the gate nearest to the parking lots.

Line of 100 people.

No one except me knew the gate 100 feet away, around the corner always had a line of like 10 people.

I find this a lot while driving. Example, you pull up to a stop light that has two lanes that turn left. There will be a dozen people in one line, leaving the other empty. I use to get to a job faster that way because of it. 100 cars going one way to work, I would turn on a road just before the one leading directly to the job and get there 15 minutes before the folks that would have been in front of me.

Unoriginal_Username: I find this a lot while driving. Example, you pull up to a stop light that has two lanes that turn left. There will be a dozen people in one line, leaving the other empty.

There's a good reason for this sometimes. If everybody wants to turn right/left immediately after the light (like onto a service road) you're going to annoy a lot of other drivers trying to change lanes so quickly after you've made the turn. There's also some intersections where there's two left turn lanes but one of the lanes ends really fast on the other road (like a turn only onto a service road) so those who want to go through get in the other lane to avoid the quick merge.

People are conditioned to stay to the right (at least in the US) so the subconscious selection is to choose the path on the right. So much so that even if you have only two escalators and you reversed the directions you'd have a backup because people would head towards the right but it's going in the wrong direction and people would freeze as they processed the change.

The central lane going in the same direction presents a similar choice. They're already heading to the right before consciously processing if there are options and by they get to the threshold, there's no point in changing.

dogboy360: It happens with a row of doors to. Everyone goes in or out one open door

Yup, I see that in my building all the time. Two #($# revolving doors, and everyone always goes in the one FURTHEST from the corner (go figure). Going to lunch with a crowd, I go out the never-used-door, and then have to wait outside while EVERYONE ELSE with me goes out the other door.

WTF people?

12349876: Unoriginal_Username: I find this a lot while driving. Example, you pull up to a stop light that has two lanes that turn left. There will be a dozen people in one line, leaving the other empty.

There's a good reason for this sometimes. If everybody wants to turn right/left immediately after the light (like onto a service road) you're going to annoy a lot of other drivers trying to change lanes so quickly after you've made the turn. There's also some intersections where there's two left turn lanes but one of the lanes ends really fast on the other road (like a turn only onto a service road) so those who want to go through get in the other lane to avoid the quick merge.

Then there are other times when it just doesn't make sense. A couple of days ago, I was going to work and I was passed by a minivan going quite fast. Not a big deal, but when we both got off at the same exit and both chose a left turn lane, the van took the lane behind a big rig. When I last saw the van it was a quarter mile back trying to catch up after finally getting out from behind the truck.

I saw that video as cattle people, too. I would rather take the other escalator or the stairs as oppose to following someone else's butt. The sad story is, I used to have a boss that made a point to go up stairs ahead of us and cropdust us on the way up. That was his nicer way of treating us. The rumor was he framed the guy I replaced with theft. I didn't hang around long.

Solkar: My personal favorite - I was at the mall with my wife. The escalators weren't working. An older couple kept pacing around the bottom, looking nervous and confused. My wife and I walked over (we needed to go upstairs).

The older lady pointed at the escalators and said, "Excuse me, but do these go up?"

My wife said, "Yes, they do." And we proceeded to walk up the escalator to the second level.

The old folks stayed below, still looking confused.



That is funny!

I can kinda see how an older person might be worried though, as they might not be able to adapt to the escalator suddenly moving in the wrong direction while they are on it. Those old people will break a hip just falling over.

I hate when some stupid couple just has to hold hands side by side not allowing me to continue up the escalators on the left side because they have to block the passing lane in the name of love or whatever.

Actually, I hate whenever able-bodied people just stand on escalators or blocks the passing lane. It kinda rustles my jimmies.


/living in Chicago
//getting a kick out of this

In the big box retail store in which I work, our head of security received a video clip in an email a few years ago. It was security camera footage at another store in the metropolitan area that happens to have a parking lot located below the store. In the video, a rather hefty woman gets on the escalator and sets her arms to rest on the rails. After a few seconds and several feet up, she grips the rails tightly, to no avail as she tips over backward and tumbles down. Freakin' hilarious.

I'm curious as to whether, in the video here, most of the people interested in ascending simply thought of the middle escalator as being a "fast lane" of sorts and, since they may have been in no particular hurry, were content to stand on the right one as it climbed.

JerseyTim: The worst part about the video are the people just standing there, especially on the down escalator.

Very much THIS. God damn it it infuriates me. I can let go for the up escalator, sure up stairs are harder than downstairs. It's forgivable laziness. But down? Fark you.

Actually, the very very very worst of this are people who just stand and ride the travelators at airports. Especially after coming off a long haul flight where most sane people would feel a bit of a need to stretch the legs out a bit, these lazy farks just decide to block the travelators while talking about how shiat the inflight movies and food were.

Arseholes.

Unoriginal_Username: downstairs: I love mob mentality and crowd theory.

I used to go to White Sox games a lot. It seems everyone would try to enter at the gate nearest to the parking lots.

Line of 100 people.

No one except me knew the gate 100 feet away, around the corner always had a line of like 10 people.

I find this a lot while driving. Example, you pull up to a stop light that has two lanes that turn left. There will be a dozen people in one line, leaving the other empty. I use to get to a job faster that way because of it. 100 cars going one way to work, I would turn on a road just before the one leading directly to the job and get there 15 minutes before the folks that would have been in front of me.

In most cases that is a merge into one lane and a this lane ends lane and the folks in the know are in the lane that you idiots want to merge into. Think we will let you in without a dent?

JerseyTim: The worst part about the video are the people just standing there, especially on the down escalator.

When a good head first dive would have have clearly been the quickest way down ? What were thay thinkin ?

99% of the time, 99% of people do exactly what everyone around them is doing because they assume it's what they're supposed to do. Applies to doors, escalators, life path, etc...

From my observations, just doing something differently than everyone else will get a better result most of the time, even if it's only for "shorter line" reasons.

The people coming in from screen right, are taking the closest up escalator.

The people coming in from screen left are taking the closest up escalator.

For you psychology/sociology majors, I'm so sorry, and best of luck in the future.

There's a perfectly good stairs to the right. They go both up and down.

The people on the right are probably herbivores. They're the ones with the herding instinct.

I thought the point was going to be that the person who took the stairs at the beginning was able to beat everyone on the escalators to the top..

I feel like what we witnessed here may have something to do with the fact that escalators tend to have stairs between the up and down. So.. people might have habitually avoided the middle one (because they're lazy).

My other theory was that people going up just didn't want to be so close to the people going down so they could avoid awkwardly avoid looking them in the face as they slowly cross paths. Thus they went to the one further to the right..

Thirdly, both escalators move at the same speed regardless how many people are standing on it.. so who gives a fark. Maybe only the people in a hurry used the middle one so they walk/run up them.

/as a side note, I do experience a similar phenomenon every time I go onto the onramp at a traffic light of a highway here in the city. It is often traffic controlled after the light during rush-hour, so everyone has to wait in line to get on. But the thing is, there are two lanes which go on.. and yet almost everyone tends to go to the one on the left regardless of how backed up it is.. leaving the right lane free for me :)

SJKebab: JerseyTim: The worst part about the video are the people just standing there, especially on the down escalator.

Very much THIS. God damn it it infuriates me. I can let go for the up escalator, sure up stairs are harder than downstairs. It's forgivable laziness. But down? Fark you.

Actually, the very very very worst of this are people who just stand and ride the travelators at airports. Especially after coming off a long haul flight where most sane people would feel a bit of a need to stretch the legs out a bit, these lazy farks just decide to block the travelators while talking about how shiat the inflight movies and food were.

Arseholes.

You sound like one of those people always in a hurry to go nowhere. I'm one of those guys, too. I like to walk fast and I live in a world where most people walk slooooooow. Drives me nuts, but since my wife is one of those slow-walking people, I'm learning to cope.

I stand still directly in the center of escalators and stretch my arms to both sides just to piss off people who get worked up about shiat that happens on escalators.

Smagma: Thirdly, both escalators move at the same speed regardless how many people are standing on it..

Until it gets overloaded and stops.

/only seen that once though at the KFC Yum Center

My first thought was that often times the middle lane like that would be just stairs. Down escalator on the left, stairs in the middle, up escalator on the right. So if you're not paying attention, you'd just kinda assume the middle was just stairs and veer toward the up escalator on the right.

What a fascinating experiment. I couldn't stop watching it. Imagine...an empty escalator. I never thought I'd see something like that in my lifetime. Thanks for posting this exciting and important case study. Riveting!

cig-mkr

We have become nothing more then herds of cattle.

since you like to swap e for a, here is what it reads like;
wa heva bacoma nothing mora than hards of cattla.
congratulations! you're drunk!

/hards of cattla
//if you are dyslexic, then please accipt mi apppolojy

Triumph: You sound like one of those people always in a hurry to go nowhere. I'm one of those guys, too. I like to walk fast and I live in a world where most people walk slooooooow. Drives me nuts, but since my wife is one of those slow-walking people, I'm learning to cope.

Nowhere my arse! Why waste time walking (standing) around like a zombie when I could be using that time to drink at the bar. Especially if I'm at an airport...

This proves people are lemmings, not that they're lazy. They are lazy though.

Am I the only one who walks up the escalator? It's faster than stairs or just standing there.

halfof33: Uh, stand on the right, walk on the left.

Are you people that dim?

So much this. Even when I am carrying a huge suitcase on the tube I carefully arrange it directly in front of me on the right side of the escalator so as to leave room for people walking on the left.

I do this primarily because I am not an ignorant coont.


/i am a well-educated coont

The McDonalds that I sometimes go to had a huge queue of people trying to get in and out of one side of the double doors. I walked up to the other side of the double door opened it and walked in. They were looking at me as if I just performed some act of magic.

Also once inside they have a policy where you queue at the tills but everyone just queues at the first one whilst moving into others as they become free. I just walked past that queue with about 20 people and moved into one that one person beng served.

thesubliminalman: In most cases that is a merge into one lane and a this lane ends lane and the folks in the know are in the lane that you idiots want to merge into. Think we will let you in without a dent?

Yes they do, and for good reason. Those late-mergers remind me of Homer: "Let me through I got here late!" I try to run people like that into utility poles, but someone else always lets them in.

The normal design I see is a set of stairs between the up and down escalators. So I'd likely avoid the middle escalator by default, since I've trained myself to expect it to be stairs.