Study: Safely Reopening Office Buildings Will Require Planning, Innovation

Share on Facebook
Share on Twitter
Share on
LinkedIn
+

Managers need to enable efficient operations, follow social distancing guidelines

BOSTON – Safely bringing employees back into workplaces presents a significant challenge for employers located in office buildings, particularly when it comes to elevator operations and building entry and exit.  To address the challenge, managers must develop plans to control the flow of workers, according to a new study published by Pioneer Institute.

“Balancing necessary social distancing guidelines and the need for employees to efficiently access offices will require innovation and careful planning,” said Rebekah Paxton, author of “Going Up: The Challenge of Reopening Shared Office Buildings in a COVID-19 World.”

May 25 was the official opening date for most Massachusetts office buildings—albeit with considerable conditions set forth in government guidance documents, while Boston buildings reopen on June 1.

Looking internationally, the One Canada Square building in London anticipates it can accommodate the expected volume of tenants and guests by moving up to 7,500 people per hour.  To do so, building managers have developed a system of designated doorless entry and exit to the building, elevators operated by PPE-equipped staff, and an estimated four-to-six-person elevator occupancy limit.

One Canada Square, with its 32 elevators that serve 50 floors, underscores a challenge for some of Boston’s most iconic properties. Boston’s Prudential Tower, for example, has 18 elevators serving 52 floors, according to a database compiled by The Skyscraper Center.  This may result in bottlenecks in the time of COVID-19.

Massachusetts’ reopening guidelines call for a limit of 25 percent of maximum workplace occupancy to limit the number of people entering office buildings and minimize back-ups in hallways, stairwells and elevator banks.  State recommendations specific to general office buildings advise managers and employees to “minimize use of confined spaces (i.e. elevators) by more than one individual at a time.” On Friday, May 29, the City of Boston released a “Return to Workplace Framework for Commercial Spaces,” which encompasses existing guidelines provided by the state for office buildings, and additionally limits elevator capacity to no more than four individuals at a time.

Employers are also developing a range of ways to manage reopening challenges.  Qualtrics, which has 25 offices across the United States, is identifying volunteers to take the stairs.  New York City-based Interpublic is taping social distancing blocks on elevator floors to show how many people can safely ride at once.  But a company official cautioned that this would translate to “two-to-three hours” to get all employees to their desks at one Interpublic location.

Technology can help address the challenge, and the report highlights examples of how various technologies can help facilitate the safe movement of individuals in multi-story buildings.  For example, Otis, an elevator technology company in London, provides apps that allow customers to call elevators with smartphones. QLess, a California-based app developer, provides apps that facilitate remote line formation, where users can be given an elevator wait time, during which they can be outside the lobby or even in their cars.

For social distancing and workplace efficiency to coexist successfully, Paxton urges that all those who can work from home continue to do so, and that employers implement flexible in-office days and staggered scheduling for those needing to access physical offices.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Rebekah Paxton is a Research Analyst at Pioneer Institute. She first joined Pioneer in 2017 as a Roger Perry intern, writing about various transparency issues within the Commonwealth, including fiscal policy and higher education. Since then, she has worked on various research projects under PioneerPublic and PioneerOpportunity, in areas of state finance, public policy, and labor relations. She recently earned an M.A. in Political Science and a B.A. in Political Science and Economics, from Boston University, where she graduated summa cum laude.

ABOUT PIONEER

Mission

Pioneer Institute develops and communicates dynamic ideas that advance prosperity and a vibrant civic life in Massachusetts and beyond.

Vision

Success for Pioneer is when the citizens of our state and nation prosper and our society thrives because we enjoy world-class options in education, healthcare, transportation and economic opportunity, and when our government is limited, accountable and transparent.

Values

Pioneer believes that America is at its best when our citizenry is well-educated, committed to liberty, personal responsibility, and free enterprise, and both willing and able to test their beliefs based on facts and the free exchange of ideas.

Get Our COVID-19 News, Tips & Resources!

  • This field is for validation purposes and should be left unchanged.

Related Posts

Jeeves & Wooster’s World The Comic Genius of P.G. Wodehouse – 30 Resources for Parents & Students

Life and writing can and should be playful, witty, light, fun, and make us smile. This is particularly important during the hard realities and sometimes loneliness of COVID, lockdowns, masks, and the increasingly stilted use of language today. To provide some much-needed comic relief and to help people of all age groups glory in the English language, take ourselves less seriously, and laugh more – please enjoy the world of P.G. Wodehouse!

Public Statement on the MA Legislature’s Blanket Pension Giveaway

Beacon Hill just put on full display what happens when it is awash in money. House Bill 2808 is entitled, “An Act relative to providing a COVID-19 retirement credit to essential public workers.”  It calls for adding three years of additional retirement credit to state “employees who have volunteered to work or have been required to work at their respective worksites or any other worksite outside of their personal residences during the COVID-19 state of emergency…” But upon reading the brief bill, it quickly becomes clear that this legislation is irresponsible in the extreme.

Employment trends in the Greater Boston Area and Touristy Massachusetts Counties during the COVID-19 Pandemic

/
Using MassEconomix, Pioneer Institute’s database on employment…

The COVID-19 Impact on Massachusetts Community College Enrollment & Success Trends

Enrollment at Massachusetts community colleges has dropped 32.61…

Elevating Liberal Democracy Above Fragmentation – 30 Resources for Citizens and Schools

In Pioneer’s ongoing series of blogs on curricular resources for parents, families, and teachers during COVID-19, this one focuses on: Elevating Liberal Democracy Above Fragmentation.

“Hellhound on My Trail” Celebrating American Blues Music – 35 Resources for Students

As music historian Ted Gioia tells us, the blues are disappearing from popular music, because of modern technology and it not being taught. American schoolchildren need to know more about the basics of blues music history and its many African-American geniuses, who reshaped the sounds and rhythms of all peoples across the globe. To remedy this, we’re offering a variety of resources to help parents, teachers, and high schoolers.

Why did some nursing homes experience more COVID-19 deaths and infections than others?

/
The COVID-19 pandemic has caused great loss for Massachusetts…

Ely Kaplansky Goes from Immigrant to Inc. 5000 Insurance Entrepreneur

This week on JobMakers, host Denzil Mohammed talks with Ely Kaplansky, President & CEO of Kaplansky Insurance. Since 1974, Ely has created hundreds of jobs in Massachusetts and beyond, with 85 employees in 15 offices across the state today, and he has grown his business during the pandemic, such that Kaplansky Insurance was named to Inc. magazine’s "5000 Fastest-Growing Private Companies in America" list. His success fulfilled the dreams of his parents when they moved from Israel to America in 1955, with just the clothes on their backs and an aunt to take them in. Their journey began in the concentration camps of Germany, and Ely’s story is all about the opportunity and freedom America offers.

Aurora Institute’s Susan Patrick on Digital Learning Lessons from COVID-19

This week on “The Learning Curve," co-hosts Gerard Robinson and Cara Candal talk with Susan Patrick, the President and CEO of Aurora Institute and co-founder of CompetencyWorks. Susan shares observations about the long-term implications of the COVID-19 pandemic for American K-12 education, and the prospects for expanding digital learning.

Celebrating American Independence! – 50 Resources on America’s Founding for Schoolchildren & Citizens

American schoolchildren need to know more about the basic history of and lessons from the American Revolution and War for Independence, including perhaps the greatest leader and hero the country has ever produced, George Washington. To do our small part to help the cause, we’re offering a variety of resources to help parents, teachers, schoolchildren, and citizens better celebrate the Fourth of July!

Why does a gender-gap persist in vaccination rates?

/
Men are more likely to die of COVID-19 than women: 13 men die…

“The Jazz Age” – 1920s America – 50 Resources for High School Students

American schoolchildren need to know more about the basics of the history of and lessons from the 1920s, which did as much as any decade to shape our modern country in the last century. To remedy this, we’re offering a variety of resources to help parents, teachers, and high schoolers: