You reach the top of the stairs at the exit of the subway, feeling like you just climbed Mount Everest. The train delays today were unbearable, but thankfully you left your house early today. Your watch reads “10:50”, leaving you with 20 minutes, more than enough time, to get to your class on the 12th floor at the Lawrence and Eris Field building. So, you stroll there from the subway station, watching all the tardy people speedwalk and run to their own classes. You’re thankful you’re not them. You cross Lexington Avenue, take out your ID and walk through the revolving doors. When you enter the building, to your horror, you see two long lines to your left and to your right, both at least a 10 minute wait. Taking the stairs is not an option, so you sigh, and withdraw to waiting on line.

Baruch College has over 17,000 students. With such a large student body over a relatively small campus, overcrowding in elevators is a common problem.What makes this problem worse, are the sluggish and outdated elevators in the Lawrence and Eris Field building. In between class times, the lines in the lobby are so outrageous that the security guards spend time having to delegate and maintain the flow of traffic. Instead of focusing on their primary responsibility of ensuring the safety and well-being of students and faculty, they must become traffic officers.

Replacing the elevators would be the best solution. Some would say that this would temporarily create more traffic. However, two of the elevators already don’t work so they can be renovated first. According to a recent article in the New York Times, “A project in a 6- to 12-story building generally costs around $125,000, while anything taller will require roughly $150,000 to $175,000. Typical lead time is six months from the hiring of a consultant to the day the job begins. Projects take around 8 to 12 weeks to complete.”