Elevator Buttons That Should Be Really Low Down Where Kids Can Reach Them

I was recently in an elevator with my three-year-old son and I became worried that, being only three years of age, he wouldn’t be able (if needed) to reach either the elevator button summoning the fire department or the one that sets off the ear-splitting alarm bell. LUCKILY, thanks to someone with a keen instinct for elevator design, those buttons were placed way down low where a three-year-old can easily get to them.

Riding elevators with young children is always a joy because it is so much fun when they start hitting all the buttons the second you turn your head/close your eyes/reach into your bag for some sort of noise cancelling headphones or a stale McDonalds apple pie that you tearfully crush into your forehead like a beer can. It is so unexpected and wonderful when my son manages to get to the easy-to-reach elevator buttons. They can’t be moved (since it’s important that people in wheelchairs be able to reach the emergency buttons if needed) but in ADDITION to the emergency buttons, here is a list of 9 additional buttons I would love to see installed at a level easily reachable for toddlers.

1. Elevator’s ceiling begins descending, slowly crushing everyone in the elevator Indiana Jones-style

This would be a great one! In addition to installing it low down, consider making it large and red and maybe twice the size of all the other buttons. Maybe it can be flashing? You guys need to think outside the box!

2. Elevator explodes instantaneously

What parent wouldn’t be on board with this? This is like a perfect representation of how the day was going anyway.

3. Tarantulas spontaneously fly out of the walls

What a great way to force lazy adults to get some exercise. I don’t know how you are with spiders but I would literally rather walk 45 flights of stairs with a three-year-old than take the chance of anyone hitting this button.

4. Elevator momentarily stops working after man who cannot stop farting gets in

My son must’ve hit this one yesterday and WE ALL OBVIOUSLY KNOW IT WAS YOU, GUY-READING-A-BUZZFEED-ARTICLE-ON-YOUR-SMARTPHONE. If your article’s so great, here’s a link to “top ten reasons you could’ve waited until you were out of the elevator to let us know you just had Mexican food.”

5. Elevator gives away spoilers to your favorite shows

UGH. Just hope you wind up in the “He picked Lauren” elevator and not the “Here’s what happened in the Game of Thrones Episode You Missed” elevator.

6.Elevator Connects with Four Other Elevators to Turn into Some Sort of Elevator Voltron

Whatever, right? It’s not like anything interesting ever happens to you, so why not have your elevator hijacked and turned into an enormous crime-fighting robot? FORM FEET AND LEGS. Who cares if you never get to your doctor’s appointment?

7. Elevator becomes stuck for hours as innocuous elevator hold music is replaced by horrifying Kars-4-Kids commercial jingle

WHO PUT THIS BUTTON DOWN LOW WHERE A TODDLER COULD REACH IT??!!?? THIS IS AN OUTRAGE. I’M AGHAST THAT ANYTHING THIS DANGEROUS WOULD BE ANYWHERE NEAR A YOUNG CHILD. PLEASE KNOW I’LL BE CIRCULATING A PETITION.

8. Elevator remains unchanged but each time this button is pressed Hollywood makes 3 more Batman and/or Spiderman movies

I think the problem with this button is that it’s shaped like the Batman symbol so people get excited and press it hoping Batman will show up and by the time they realize their mistake the studios have already shot 20,000 hours of footage.

9. Button that makes a really boring person walk into the elevator and start a conversation with you

Oh for the love of God, no, not Dave with another 30-minute story about his golfbag-shaped skin lesions. I’m sorry, I just can’t do that twice in one week. Where’s the button that makes the elevator explode again? Thanks.

* * *

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Comments

15 responses to “Elevator Buttons That Should Be Really Low Down Where Kids Can Reach Them”

Matticus

March 23, 2016

One Eight Seven Seven Cars for Kids, that’s K A R S Cars for Kids.
Just. Shoot. Me. Now!
And the spider one. Why? Why?!!? Yes, I’ll be taking the stairs from now on too. Even though with our 3 year old that means he has to walk every single one three times. Up. Down. Up.

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Sacha

March 23, 2016

It’s an interesting design problem: alarm low enough for someone in a wheelchair, or who has collapsed, to use but should not be able to be pressed by marauding weans, and that mechanism in itself should not be the most interesting thing that said wean has ever seen. Someone might have already told you this, but the term for a barrier that prevents a button being accidentally pressed is a molly-guard, named for the child of a mainframe developer who kept pushing an important button.

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1. theuglyvolvo
  
  March 23, 2016
  
  Yes– I knew they had to be wheelchair height but hadn’t even thought of someone who had collapsed as well. And no, the molly guard story is hilarious– how do you have so much information about elevators??
  
  Reply
Lynne Childress

March 23, 2016

We are also so fortunate that those buttons are bright red AND on their level, in case they missed them on their own. Oh, and elevator phone is nice and accessible to little kids too. Good one.
This was an awesome post.

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A Morning Grouch

March 23, 2016

Haha, seriously. They’re basically Make The Parent Panic Buttons. Or You Can’t Even Relax During This 30 Second Elevator Ride buttons. #alwaysonduty

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Krystal

March 23, 2016

If the emergency buttons were high up how would people in wheel chairs and little people reach them?

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1. theuglyvolvo
  
  March 23, 2016
  
  No, I am very aware. I was just venting because my kid constantly almost-gets to the buttons every time we ride. Sorry!
  
  Reply
Elissa Watts

March 23, 2016

BRILLIANT. I live in St Andrews, Scotland, where there are two elevators in town, to my knowledge at least. One is at the hospital; the other is at H&M (because what seaside Scottish town doesn’t need a two-storey Swedish wear-and-toss retailer?) We don’t own a car and we seldom leave town but today we had to hit up the nearest city. My two kids were running wild in Elevator Central. I nearly had a heart attack. This post was perfectly timed. Bravo.

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1. theuglyvolvo
  
  March 23, 2016
  
  Glad the timing was on the ball. I’ll now think about elevators every time I’m in Manhattan at the St. Andrews restaurant and bar which has, in my opinion, the best ribs in the entire city.
  
  Reply
Jenna

March 23, 2016

My mother’s rather brilliant solution to this problem was to convince my twins that the MUST hold on to the railings during the elevator ride. Worked like a charm for us in many places…the pronounce it “radials” and insist on all the strangers in the elevator hold on as well….most comply. Then I started to notice how many elevators DO NOT have railings and then I have to do a standup act in front of the panel (God help me if there are 2 panels of buttons)

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Jenelle

March 23, 2016

You forgot to add the button that offers your child a balloon that pops after one minute.

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Regina Northeast

March 23, 2016

One of my fears as a granny of a 2 and a half year old boy is that one day he will press the call button while I am at the ticket machine (which is a good ‘run’ from the elevator) and board the elevator without me.

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Laurie

March 23, 2016

You are literally saving my driven-to-exhaustion-by-two-year-old-tantrums life. Thank you for your hilarious–and totally relevant posts!

A couple months ago, my son managed to contact whoever answers the emergency button on two separate occasions while staying at a hotel. The first time they were slightly amused, but the second time they became quite irate. Apparently they’re not aware that toddlers cannot avoid pushing buttons, especially if they are big red buttons at eye level that make cool things happen.

And, as a grammar nerd, I have to tell you that you actually do not need to say “to which you set your mind.” This convention was started by people who were extremely fond of Latin and thought it was the perfect language. You can’t make a sentence in which the proposition is at the end in Latin, so they decided that we shouldn’t do it in English either. This makes no sense at all, and modern grammarians don’t follow that. So keep saying “You can do anything you set your mind to” without any guilt! 🙂 You can save the guilt for that stash of chocolate you’re not letting the children have. 😉

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Regina Northeast

March 23, 2016

A tad off the subject of elevator buttons, but still on the subject of buttons. Panic buttons. Two and half year old visited Daddy at work and found the panic button, which is situated down low, at perfect toddler height, and of course, he pressed it. Two police cars later, raised eyebrows and a stern warning for Daddy, said toddler will never be allowed behind the counter again 🙂

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Theresa

March 30, 2016

Amazing. Again. The Batman movie button? I love it. Really. Hilarious. And again, a well thought out and meaningful observation of society’s inability to take parenting challenges into account when designing something used by the public. And hilarious (but I think I said that already).

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