Author Archives: peter

Harrah’s Resort Atlantic City Casino Escalator

One unusual feature of the Harrah’s Resort in Atlantic City is the inaccessibility of the parking garage fly-bridge. This escalator is the route most hotel guests will take – unless they use valet parking. Although the parking garage has an elevator serving all six floors, the fly-bridge on the 2nd floor that connects the parking garage to the main building (and casino) are accessible only by a short run of stairs and a narrow escalator to the main casino floor. The handicap accessible route is to take the parking garage elevator to the ground floor (requiring handicapped patrons to actually leave the enclosed building and cross the street). This also presents an unusual level of luggage and strollers being taken on this escalator, despite its extremely narrow profile. On a previous trip, I watched as a woman with a stroller nearly lost control and dropped her child. Certainly this is an area for improvement for accessibility of Harrah’s Resort.

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Harrah’s Resort Atlantic City Parking Garage Elevator

Taking a ride on the elevator in the parking garage at Harrah’s Resort Atlantic City. One interesting feature of these elevators that is not immediately apparent from the video is the presence of a “Door Hold” button in addition to the usual “Door Open” and “Door Close” buttons. These elevators have a very fast door cycle time – passengers have only a moment to enter and exit the elevator. Whereas the “Door Open” button keeps the doors open while continuous pressure is applied, pressing the “Door Hold” button momentarily provides at least 15 seconds of door dwell time, allowing passengers to unload their luggage without having to manually “hold” the doors by interrupting the photo sensor circuit.

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Bally’s Atlantic City Parking Garage Elevator

Taking a quick ride on the parking garage elevator in Bally’s Atlantic City. Normally these elevators are fairly clean, but this time, the elevator smelled like a discarded sandwich.

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Bally’s Atlantic City Connector Moving Walkway

A long series of fly-bridge connectors between the parking garage at Bally’s Atlantic City and the Bally’s / Wild Wild West / Caesar’s casinos uses these Otis moving walkways to speed up the trip and get patrons into the casino faster.

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Bally’s Atlantic City Claridge Palace Theater Secret Hydraulic Elevator

It turns out that this elevator at Bally’s Atlantic City is not intended for regular passenger use. A placard on the 2nd floor reads, “For use of elevator call #3164”. However, on the 3rd floor, near the Palace Theater box office in the old Claridge hotel, there was no sign. So we hopped on this elevator thinking nothing out of the ordinary. I then mistakenly pushed the 1st floor button and wound up in an abandoned bus station, apparently sealed off from the rest of the world. Certainly something for further investigation!

I was also concerned by the extremely slow speed of this elevator, which made it seem like it was entrapping passengers. It took nearly 40 seconds to go 2 floors. Also when it was traveling in the up direction, when it arrived at the second floor, there was a very noticeable jolt as a cavitation bubble in the hydraulic system caused a pressure drop. Cavitation in a hydraulic elevator is often indicative of low fluid levels in the reserve tank – the pump draws in air instead of fluid – which also means that this elevator is very poorly maintained and would certainly not pass a thorough inspection! Given that it is inside a casino, there are almost certainly political reasons that such an elevator would remain in service in such an unmaintained state. “Maybe it’s in bad shape, maybe it’s not.” Ya know.

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Bally’s Atlantic City Casino Floor Main Elevator

Taking a ride on one of three main passenger elevators that link the casino floor (2nd floor) at Bally’s Atlantic City with the street level (1st floor), executive offices (4th floor), and the restaurants, exhibition spaces, and poker room on the 6th floor.

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Lawsuit filed in Dudley, MA toddler escalator death

In a wrongful-death complaint filed Wednesday in Worcester Superior Court, lawyers for Eric and Laura DiBona claim that the escalator at Sears “created a dangerous and defective condition” that violated state building codes, escalator safety standards and ASME standards.

Mark DiBona was at Sears with his family on March 11 when he fell from the second floor to the first through a 6-inch gap between the escalator and the adjacent balustrade. The gap was 2 inches wider than allowed under state building code, said Tom Smith, the family’s lawyer. Mark died of head injuries the following day.

Read the full story via Boston Herald – Parents sue over toddler’s escalator death

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Philadelphia man celebrating 25th birthday falls down elevator shaft, dies

Police say the victim was celebrating his birthday and had been drinking throughout the evening when he left his 5th floor apartment and tried to take an older elevator to the first floor to get more of his friends. He pulled the gate opened but the elevator wasn’t there. He stepped in and plunged four floors, landing on the top of the elevator.

Read the full story via ABC6 Action News, Philadelphia, PA

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Boston Convention & Exhibition Center – The 0th Floor

A slow moving hydraulic elevator at the Boston Convention & Exhibition Center that is otherwise pretty unremarkable, besides its unique floor numbering. For some reason, the exhibition floor is the “0th” floor. While it is set below ground level, it is unusual to go 0, 1, 2. Filmed at PAX East 2011, which I was attending as the official photographer for Hot Blooded Gaming.

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