Comment by firefoxd | Hacker News Reader

Comment by firefoxd | Hacker News Reader

In the name of security, Big Blue decided to add keycards to go through every single door. It's understandable. They first added the card readers over the span of months, getting people used to them even if they weren't functional. Then they added the turnstile at the entrance. It's a good idea to allow only authenticated people into your building.

What they didn't take into account was the number of people that go in and out of the building every single day. Imagine a 12 story building with at least a hundred people on each floor on the average day. And they had to be funnelled through a single turnstile. Then there is the elevators.

One morning, everything was activated at once. The line backed all the way outside the building and wrapped around. You could spend up to twenty minutes to get into the building. Then once you are in, you have to wait for the elevators. You have to scan your keycard to get to your floor. Now try doing that with 30 people in the elevator and they all want to go to a different floor.

"Can you press 11 for me?"

They couldn't, because their card only works for the third floor.

In less than a week they shut everything down and went back to the designing board. They had to rebuild the reception to add 4 turnstile. The elevators keycard readers were never reactivated again.

I started taking stairs and never looked back.

In the buildings I've seen with that kind of security, the elevator lobby on each floor was unsecured, and then you had a door to the secure area.

Of course, during high-traffic hours people just hold the door for each other, defeating the purpose.

That's better for security as well. Elevators with keycards have to have overrides for firefighters.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JBERTNSuZR8 is an interesting talk on the subject.

Or just declare them firefigter unsafe by making it carry less than 250kg at a time (rescue via elevators an elevator capable of at least four persons at a time).

My personal experience has been a key card check to get into the building and another at your secure area. Corporate security made it very clear that holding the door open for someone else would be taken extremely seriously.

>What they didn't take into account was the number of people that go in and out of the building every single day. Imagine a 12 story building with at least a hundred people on each floor on the average day. And they had to be funnelled through a single turnstile. Then there is the elevators.

A FAANG did this in a European country and it's amazing to see the backlogged line after things like pre-determined fire drills.

Took to waiting for 30 minutes because I didn't create the problem but I was getting paid, either way, so, why should I have to "fight the crowd" to achieve the same goal, which comes with more stress and effort, when I could simply do it on my own terms?

Maybe the secret plan was healthier employees lol.

Visited a friend that lived in a building like that.

For the elevators, I just followed someone out from the nearest level above, and took the stairs down.

Fire code designated their (all?) level as a “crossover” and required it to allow entry from the stairwell.

Makes sense: you could enter a stairwell, but be unable to exit through that one.

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