Kopi with Bertha: Not uplifting news

by Bertha Henson

WHEN I was growing up, the earth was flat. The first time the term “lift” entered my consciousness was when the Robinson Department store caught fire in 1972. This little girl recalled her parents talking about shoppers trapped in a lift while the building was ablaze. The image that took hold in my mind was that of a metal coffin with charred bodies.

It was nice to live on a flat earth. There weren’t many tall buildings in the 70s. There was a lift in my primary school which reached to the fourth floor but not many of us girls used it. We preferred the faster way of running up and down the stairs which also meant that we won’t run into teachers. When my family moved to a HDB flat located on the fifth floor, our home was just one flight from the lift landing. Again, it was faster to run down the five flights of stairs to the ground floor. My late grandmother, however, had lift phobia. They were new structures to her and looked like, yes, metal coffins.

How uplifting the times have been!

Now I use lifts that seem to be smarter than me, requiring me to press all sorts of buttons before getting me to where I want to be. Then the express lifts which make your ears pop – and the lifts which require passes to deter intruders. I used to think the lift which services our office building was some kind of horror chamber. It is big because it doubles as a cargo lift, and opens and closes oh so slowly – with a blood-curdling death rattle. It has since been upgraded so the insides are shinier. The rattle is still there though.

Truth to tell, I sometimes think I put my life at risk by being in the enclosed space of a lift. This is probably the result of watching too many movies of people stuck in lifts in blackouts and having to climb out into the lift shaft.  Come to think of it, do lifts have standby lights? Can you suffocate in a lift? I’m glad most HDB lifts have got little peek-a-boo windows on the doors, although it must be bad for courting couples for whom the lift is the only form of privacy for goodnight kisses.

Because we use lifts all the time, every time there is trouble with one, we get particularly concerned. The recent lift incidents are just too scary to contemplate: a severed hand, an accelerating lift, a man who died because his mobility vehicle fell over a step that shouldn’t be there. These are just a handful of incidents given the thousands of lifts in Singapore. But they all happened in HDB blocks. Is there some reason they don’t happen to office blocks? Are they better maintained or do they just go unreported?

The authorities are having a hard time convincing people that old lifts don’t mean they are un-usable provided they have been maintained properly. On average, lifts are replaced every 28 years. Given the lift upgrading programme, most HDB lifts have already been replaced at least once. But you never know with malfunctioning parts, right? Or blind spots which sensors cannot detect and the lift door closes on you because of a thin leash? Or thinking it’s safe to move backwards out of a lift because it is level with the landing. Or having to belt yourself to something because the lift decides to accelerate.

Under the Town Councils Act and Rules, each town council is required to set aside a minimum portion of their service and conservancy charges collected, and grants-in-aid received to fund its cyclical works, which include the replacement of lifts and lift parts. This portion is 30 per cent for one- to three-room flats, and 35 per cent for larger flats. The G is thinking of “ring-fencing” the lift portion.

Now what about maintenance?

You know, I used to spend my time reading and re-reading that notice that is pasted on the inside of the lift telling occupants when it was last serviced. A few years ago, these notices disappeared. It seems town councils have taken over and there’s no need for such reading material anymore. Maybe they should resurrect the practice, just to tell residents when the lift was last serviced. It would give some degree of comfort even if there’s no guarantee that the lift won’t break down.

We never really think very much about lift maintenance do we? We grumble and complain when the lift is dirty of course but how many of us actually bother to check when the lift was last serviced or the parts replaced? In fact, we’re more likely to grumble when the lift is out of action for maintenance purposes because it means we have to leg it.

It is easy to say that it is somebody else’s job. We pay service and conservancy fees after all. And there’s the law to make sure things go right. In fact, I’m going to say it: It is somebody else’s job. Clean surroundings and safe, functioning lifts are the least residents can expect of their town council. There should be no return of lift-phobia.

In this column, consulting editor Bertha Henson muses about life and living – and makan – through the scenes she witnesses in her neighbourhood.

 

Featured Image by Natassya Diana.

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The post Kopi with Bertha: Not uplifting news appeared first on The Middle Ground.

- Bertha Henson