Mini Elevator

🔥 Turin has an elevator just 45 centimeters wide. And the locals consider it a real blessing

Imagine an elevator you can’t enter together with a regular suitcase.

First you have to put your luggage inside, then carefully squeeze in after it. Otherwise, you may simply not be able to get out on the floor you need.

This very elevator operates right in the center of Turin.

It is only 45 centimeters wide, has a maximum load of 200 kilograms, and the ride from the first to the fifth floor takes about a minute and a half.

At first glance, it seems like a tourist attraction. But no. People use it every day.

What’s more, one resident said he was surprised at first too and asked the apartment’s former owner:

“Couldn’t they have made it bigger?”

The answer turned out to be unexpected:

“Think about how it was before. I used to walk up to the fifth floor every day with bags.”

After that, even such a tiny elevator no longer seems strange.

The reason for its size is interesting too. The elevator was built into an old building, where widening the shaft is practically impossible without altering the building’s historic structure. So the engineers had to find a compromise between modern convenience and preserving the architecture.

This is one of those stories that shows the real Turin well. Behind the beautiful facades, unusual engineering solutions and everyday stories often hide here, known only to the locals.

Would you risk going up to the fifth floor in an elevator just 45 centimeters wide?

first: it won’t appear — this is not France or England, Italians are slackers no worse than our own people. And they’re hardly likely to start handing out money.

Second: it simply won’t be understood. All the people I know who have been to Italy unanimously say that the Italians, for the most part, give a damn about the English language, and don’t understand it at all. And the image of a fat Black woman just does not fit, in my mind, with the phrase: Ottimo, grazie, agente.