GB2315567A - Indicating relevant lobby area for elevators - Google Patents

Abstract

An elevator control system for a building having a number of separate lobby areas serving each floor provides for more efficient operation by directing passengers outside the lobby areas to a lobby area serving a particular floor or floors in accordance with prevailing traffic patterns. To further enhance flow of passengers within the building, through lifts may be used to allow entrance/exit to particular floor to be made via a selected lobby area.

Description

TITLE: IMPROVEMENTS IN ELEVATOR CONTROL SYSTEMS DESCRIPTION: This invention may be applied to elevator systems designed for servicing any given building and its working population plus visitors. It does not modify or change any of the present rules and design guidelines for sizing elevator systems but rather allows the elevator system designer a new degree of freedom and flexibility to combine conventionally separate groups of lifts such as to achieve the following functions as a minimum: 1. Trade off quality of service (average intervals and waiting times) for quantity of service (handling capacity) or vice versa and vary the number of floors served by each group of elevators.

2. Combine groups of elevators when one of those groups has reduced capacity due to breakdown or special usage.

3. Respond to specific time sensitive requirements for moving parties or groups of users into, around or out of the building.

4. Segregate different types of users dependent upon security issues and destination in the building by limiting certain elevators to accessing specific lobbies and directing users to the appropriate lobbies.

The invention is particularly suitable to (though not limited to) use of "through" elevator cars (with entrances front and rear) in order to generate distinctly separate lobby areas that can then have users directed to them by means of this invention. This invention represents an improvement in elevator control systems by extending the elevator control system to control electronic information screens outside of the elevator lobbies themselves. This improvement provides for considerable extra flexibility for the elevator system affecting quality and quantity of service, security of access etc that can be made available. These improvements can be made available by the following means; 1. All elevator cars for each group/zone are preferably installed as "through" cars under one overall group control which can be subdivided into separate subgroups.

2. Electronic information screens are placed in conspicuous locations at one or more floors served by the elevator system outside the elevator lobby areas to direct users to distinctly different lobbies dependent upon the elevator control system's requirements.

3. A part of the elevator control system will also control separate electronic information screens placed above or alongside the car doors for each "through" elevator car forming a part of the entire elevator system. These "exit" direction screens allow the control system to vary the respective entrance and exit sides for each car both at different floors of the building and at different times.

4. The elevator control system may also receive information from crowd sensors in each lobby served by the elevators and loadweighing and "empty car" information from each elevator car in order to continuously monitor traffic demand and usage and make more informed decisions on the utilisation of lobbies and the total elevator resource.

This invention allows an elevator system designer to incorporate conventional elevator systems (including single and double deck types, shuttle or local zone elevators, as required) which, by their physical arrangement in the building, possible use of "through" cars, control system grouping and use of special electronic signage systems to direct users to the appropriate lobby will ensure better service levels can be achieved for users under differing elevator traffic conditions in the building.

This invention allows groups (one car or more) of preferably '1through car" elevators, be they local zone elevators serving users ultimate destination floors or shuttle elevators carrying users to sky lobbies (either single or double deck type elevators), to be arranged such that the control system may direct users to differing lobbies dependent upon prevailing traffic conditions, control system decisions, security arrangements etc.

This invention allows the elevator control system to decide whether to utilise single or multiple elevators to service particular lobbies in the building and decide upon relative priority for those users and what destinations (lobbies) they may be allowed access to.

This invention allows the elevator control system (or building manager or other person interacting with the elevator control system), via the large electronic information screens outside the elevator lobbies and those "exit" screens within each elevator, where '1through11 elevators are used, to reverse or modify the circulation routes for different users into and out of each elevator car and lobby. In this way the elevator control system will be able to smooth circulation flows and assist in efficient transfer of users throughout the building at different times under different traffic conditions.

The invention will be further described by way of example with reference to the accompanying drawings in which Figure 1 is a typical "destination lobby control" elevator system (the subject of this invention) arrangement for eight elevators and Figure 2 describes typical uses of electronic information screens for directing users.

The elevators for a given building are very preferably (though not always) arranged, in accordance with this invention, to be "through cars" with any given group of elevators capable of being subdivided into at least two subgroups. Figure 1 shows a typical eight car group subdivided into two four car groups of "through cars" producing three distinct lobbies at one more levels in the building. (An alternative arrangement might be non "through" cars in two banks with two separate lobbies whereby users could be directed to either lobby by the information screens).

In the arrangement described in Figure 1 the two subgroups might be assigned to serve specific upper floors or zones of the building during "up peak" when the largest volumes of users are entering the building during the morning. Users would be directed via the electronic information screens, as shown in Figure 2B, to the outer two lobbies and generally directed to exit the cars in the central lobby area at upper floors or as directed by the "exit" direction screens inside each car adjacent to the car doors (locations depicted in Figure 1).

If, at other times of the day, the control system wished to take advantage of using the full eight car group to despatch users to a given floor or set of floors served by all eight cars it could switch the electronic signs (see Figure 2A) to direct people to a common centre lobby where all eight cars would be available. In this way, in lighter traffic conditions, waiting times will be significantly less due to the availability of all eight cars to service the user's landing calls within the central lobby. In such circumstances users arriving at the main floor could now be directed to exit at the outer lobbies or at the central lobby as directed by the "exit" direction screens located inside each car adjacent to each car door. The circulation flows illustrated in Figure 1 are arbitrary and many other permutations are possible e.g.

where users board an elevator in a central lobby and also alight at a central lobby at their destination.

As can be seen in Figure 2A the elevator control system could also decide when to allow access to certain other floors of the building e.g. restaurant floors etc dependent either upon fixed programmed times, intervention by building manager or other person with the system or dependent upon the traffic levels in the building generally.

The advantage of this invention is many fold in that in some arrangements it seeks not only to take advantage of the well known inherently faster turnround times for passengers boarding and alighting "through cars" and the possibility of having associated unidirectional circulation flows at any given point in time but, by use of this invention, the control system can now respond flexibly to user demands for elevator service in the building by making use of the entire group to improve quality of service during certain times of the day or, in effect "subzone" and reduce stops thereby boosting handling capacity etc during other times.

When cars with front entrances only are used it could be envisaged that the elevator system could be arranged to serve a number of common or overlapping floors in the building and dependent upon various conditions the electronic information screens could direct users to the lobby deemed most appropriate at that time for serving particular floors. The elevator control system when combined with crowd sensors at the various lobbies served by the elevator groups can also make full use of the lift resource available by assigning more or less elevators to each lobby (or floor(s) of the building) and directing users to differing lobbies as it may decide in order to better serve their needs. In addition since the large electronic information screens are software addressable specific parties of users can be directed to lobbies that can be temporarily secured for access by specific users at certain times.

"Through" cars allow the elevator control system maximum flexibility to dictate which lobbies users shall be delivered to thereby segregating them from other users.

The elevator control system now has the opportunity to continuously evaluate the merits of combining or breaking down the group of elevators, varying the floors or zones served by each subgroup of elevators as appropriate and directing users to differing lobbies. It may also, in effect, close off lobbies and then direct specific parties of users e.g. a coach party of visitors to a specific lobby and take all users from that lobby only to one specific destination in the meantime continuing to serve other users in the building with elevators to and from alternative lobbies.

The sets of "exit" direction screens in each elevator car can also be addressed to vary the lobby destination of users to avoid lobby congestion by selecting lobbies least crowded for users to alight. It is envisaged that the elevator control system will be able to permanently display the demand (number of users) in each lobby, the number of users (passengers) in each elevator, the activation or removal of lobbies from service, the circulation paths in use, the special status of lobbies relative to special user groups and the ongoing performance of the entire system with respect to hall response times at each lobby and the relative usage both real-time and historical of each lobby.

Modifications which will be apparent to those skilled in the art may be made without departing from the scope of the invention.

Claims (5)

Claims:

1. An elevator control system for a building having a plurality of elevator lobby areas on at least one floor is characterised in that an information screen positioned outside the lobby areas selectably indicates an appropriate lobby area for travel by an elevator car to a particular destination floor in accordance with a selected control algorithm or manual control means.

2. A control system as claimed in Claim 1, further characterised in that it includes means for monitoring at least the traffic conditiors, the time of day, and other factors to facilitate the selection of the most appropriate floors served from each lobby area.

3. A control system as claimed in any preceding Claim, further characterised in that the elevator car is of the through type whereby the car may be accessed/exited from a lobby area at either end of the car.

4. A control system as claimed in Claim 3, further characterised in that a screen placed at each end of the car selectably indicates an exit to a selected lobby area in accordance with the control algorithm or manual control means.

5. A control system substantially as described herein with reference to the accompanying drawings.