March 7, 2018

On the Other Hand …

Two entrances to businesses on Robson Street.  Both require using the left-hand door or escalator, not the normally expected right-hand access.
It’s such an obvious reversal of the expected norm, there must be a reason.  What is it?

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  1. The “handing” of doors is variable for good reason — usually so that people leaving the store don’t have to cross over the people entering the store. For example, at a local Safeway, the doors on the left side of the cashiers are opposite to the doors on the right side so that people coming out of store, whichever direction they go, leave by the closest door without crossing over traffic coming in. Generally that’s true with escalators in stores although not always. Sometimes stores intentionally program the escalators to create the least efficient way for people to get out of the store and the most efficient way for people to be made to walk past more goods on each floor.

  2. That’s what I think too (but it is still annoying).
    At the Homesense, the reversal prevents exiting customers from crossing the path of entering customers.
    The same applies to parking garage entrances on one-way streets.
    Drivers / cars enter on the “near” lane and cars exit on the “far” lane.
    The directions are usually clearly marked.
    The Homesense escalators are marked above but it’s not :”in your face” obvious the way a garage entrance is marked.
    PS – it’s only a North American norm, as in the UK (and Japan) where people drive on the left, escalators are as seen at the Homesense.

  3. The same thing at my local Safeway here in Langley City. Here, I think it’s because they’re routing the traffic to the left as you enter the store — the cashiers are to the right, closest to the exit door.
    I don’t understand the rationale for the escalator.

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