Getting an empty elevator at North Atlanta High School is rarer than winning the lottery. The gigantic Buckhead public school, North Atlanta High school, is filled with 8 elevators and everyday when the students roll in at eight am, its like the hunger games trying to salvage a spot for yourself on one of the elevators. I mean seriously, I’ve experienced people getting pushed out of the elevator just so the remaining riders can have extra wiggle room for their bags and buddies. Recently this year, some of the North Atlanta elevators have been facing maintenance issues. To start, multiple floors elevator buttons have been jammed or broken over the past years. For example, I have been a student at NAHS for 3 years now and not a single year of my high school experience have the 5th floors left side elevator buttons worked. Additionally and most importantly, multiple groups of children have gotten stuck between floors on elevators this year leading to a dreadfully long and scorching wait for rescue. You’d think that the APS administration would send a maintenance group to prevent the problem from stopping again, however, I haven’t seen a maintenance team on campus just yet.
Every other week, I experience one or two students rushing into one of my daily four periods with a bright red, sweaty complexion pleading to the teacher to not mark them tardy due to a inconvenience with the elevator. After new years, when students returned to the eleven-story campus, the North Atlanta elevators seemed to have a slight change as the “this elevator is overloaded” announcement became much more common. It appears to me that this change in the elevator system is most likely what caused the rates of North Atlanta elevators getting stuck between floors to rise. “I got stuck on a cramped elevator once, it was so cramped to the point where a student was sitting on another student’s shoulder. The door got closed shut in between two floors and it got really hot, really fast. To try and cool down, everyone placed their bookbags on one side of the elevator, to think back to it now, it didn’t do much, but it sure seemed like it did in the moment. After 20 or so, the Atlanta fire department was notified of the hectic elevator malfunction, the department sped over, and eventually we were released.” said Junior Anika Kumar.
On the other hand, the rapid elevator malfunctioning rates rising could also possibly fall under the fact that students tend to be stubborn when it comes to the debate over who will get off an overflowed elevator. For some reason it doesn’t occur to all students that people have places to be. For example, I got on an elevator one morning at 8:15 and it took ten or so lengthy minutes of bickering between the last group of girl friends who walked onto on the elevator over who will get off, and who wont. That day, I was tardy to first period, over a overloaded elevator. As much as I hate to even have to say this, the North Atlanta elevators either need serious maintenance done on them, or, North Atlanta students need to learn proper elevator etiquette one being that people have places to be, and also, being cramped is not fun, for anyone.
