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Travails of flat dwellers
View(s):Residents living in the ‘Sahashrapura Housing Scheme’ at Wanathamulla are severely inconvenienced due to the malfunctioning of lifts.
In many of the blocks of flats, out of the six lifts installed, only two are operational. The service lifts too are malfunctioning.
As a result, residents living on the upper floors -a number of whom are patients- are at times forced to use the staircases.
A.A. Chandrasiri, 56, a resident at the scheme said, in comparison to the number of persons living at the scheme, the number of lifts available are totally inadequate. He emphasised that authorities should ensure all lifts were operational.
He said a failure to keep lifts functioning in schemes such as the one at Wanathamulla, would discourage people from moving into these schemes which were set up to accommodate people who are evicted from their homes to make way for diverse schemes including expansion of roads.
He added that a number of switches indicating the floor were damaged and had been left unmaintained for several months.
This year ‘'Avurudu festivities’ had to be held within each level as residents would have had to walk up and down too many flights of stairs
Residents who live on the upper floors of these 14 storeyed block of flats are often forced to use the staircase as the lifts don't function
In many instances a single lift serves the needs to residents of all 14 storeys in the building
In a number of instances the buttons indicating the floor levels are broken and not repaired
This lift has been out of order for the past three years, but as residents are from low income families authorities do not pay heed to their problems
People find it difficult to get in and out of the few lifts available