2024.05.14

Safety risks with older elevators in Sweden

New and well-modernized elevators are very safe means of transportation. However, more than half of all elevators in Sweden are older than 30 years, which means that users often travel in elevators that lack important safety equipment.

In recent years, there have been several accidents involving older elevators in residential buildings, where children in particular have been seriously injured. The Swedish Elevator Association has therefore produced a report that both describes the most common risks and provides a number of suggestions for how safety can be improved.

The Swedish Elevator Association assesses that the regulations must be changed and that we must introduce retroactive requirements for updating safety equipment. The technical solutions exist, but according to current regulations, the safety equipment in old elevators only needs to be updated in the event of a major modernization of the elevator. However, the decision to modernize lies entirely with the property owner.

Previous regulatory changes have yielded very good results, for example when elevators without protection in the car opening in workplaces were banned back in 2012. It is not acceptable that residential buildings, where the most vulnerable in society such as children, the elderly and people with disabilities live, do not have the same safety standards and security as workplaces.

See below an interview with the chairman of the Swedish Elevator Association, Daniel Nyman, about the report "Safety risks with older elevators".