This article summarises publicly-available content of NBC 2016. The full code (BIS publication) is the authoritative reference; verify specific values with your State Building Bye-Laws before relying on them in design submissions.
NBC 2016 Part 8 Section 5 Explained — Lifts, Escalators, Sizing, Speed and Numbers
A high-rise stands or falls commercially on the quality of its vertical transport. Too few lifts, or lifts that are too slow, and the building fails its peak-hour handling test on day one. National Building Code of India 2016, Part 8 — Building Services, Section 5 — Installation of Lifts and Escalators is the reference document that prescribes how many lifts a building needs, what size and speed they should be, what pit depth and overhead clearance the structural team must provide, and what escalator angle and speed are permitted. Part 8 Section 5 aligns with the IS 14665 series, which is the detailed Indian lift-engineering standard.
This article walks through how to size vertical transport for an Indian high-rise — population-based lift counts, handling capacity, standard car sizes, speed vs height bands, pit and headroom dimensions, escalator geometry, and fireman's-lift requirements that link back to fire-safety provisions of Part 4. Where specific values would require verbatim reproduction of NBC or IS 14665 tables, descriptive language replaces citations.
1. What Part 8 Section 5 covers (and what it doesn't)
Part 8 Section 5 covers the design, installation, testing and maintenance of lifts and escalators. Its scope includes:
- Classification of lifts — passenger, goods, hospital bed, service, fireman's
- Population assessment for lift sizing
- Handling capacity calculation — 5-minute peak demand
- Interval / waiting-time targets for different occupancies
- Car sizes and door widths
- Speed selection by building travel height
- Shaft / hoistway dimensions, pit depth, overhead headroom
- Machine-room dimensions and ventilation (MR traction) or machine-room-less (MRL) allowances
- Fireman's lift provision, power supply, shaft fire rating
- Escalator geometry, angle, speed, balustrade height, combplate safety
- Moving walkways
- Inspection, testing and commissioning
- Maintenance access and periodic inspection regime
Part 8 Section 5 does not cover electrical design of the building (that is Part 8 Section 2) or the architectural space-planning of lift lobbies — lobby widths come from Part 4 (fire) and Part 3 (circulation).
2. Population assessment — the basis for lift count
Lift count starts with population. Part 8 Section 5 and IS 14665 prescribe indicative occupant densities by occupancy:
| Occupancy | Typical design population |
|---|---|
| Residential (flats) | 1.5–2.0 persons per habitable room; or headcount per family |
| Hotel | 1.5 persons per guest room + staff |
| Office / Business | 1 person per 8–12 m² net area (higher density for call-centres) |
| Hospital | Bed count + visitors + staff per bed ratio |
| Retail / Mall | 1 person per 3–5 m² gross leasable area |
| Educational | Seat count + staff per classroom / hall |
The population that drives sizing is the peak-hour population on upper floors — morning up-peak for offices, lunchtime for mixed-use, school-arrival for educational. For residential, the peak is evening down-peak plus morning up-peak; for hospitals, visiting-hour up-peak.
3. Handling capacity — the 5-minute test
Lift system sizing is governed by handling capacity — the fraction of building population that the lifts move in a five-minute peak period. Target values:
| Occupancy | Handling capacity target | Target interval |
|---|---|---|
| Prestige office | 15–17% in 5 min | 25–30 s |
| Good office | 12–15% in 5 min | 30–35 s |
| Residential | 5–7% in 5 min | 60–90 s |
| Hotel | 10–15% in 5 min | 40–60 s |
| Hospital | 10–12% in 5 min (inc. bed lifts) | 45–60 s |
| Retail | Covered largely by escalators; lifts 8–10% | 45–60 s |
The lift consultant runs a traffic simulation against these targets. The simulation output — number of cars, size of each car, speed, target floor zoning — is the deliverable that decides column layout in the core. Get it wrong early, and retrofitting lifts into a completed core is effectively impossible.
4. Standard car sizes — 8, 10, 13, 16 and 20-passenger
Part 8 Section 5 — and IS 14665 Part 2 — recognise standardised car capacities. Working figures:
| Capacity | Rated load | Car internal size (typical) | Shaft size (typical) |
|---|---|---|---|
| 8 passenger | 544 kg | 1100 × 1350 mm | 1700 × 1800 mm |
| 10 passenger | 680 kg | 1350 × 1400 mm | 1900 × 1900 mm |
| 13 passenger | 884 kg | 1600 × 1400 mm | 2200 × 1900 mm |
| 16 passenger | 1088 kg | 1950 × 1400 mm | 2550 × 1900 mm |
| 20 passenger | 1360 kg | 2150 × 1500 mm | 2750 × 2050 mm |
| Hospital bed lift (26-pax equivalent) | 1600–2000 kg | 1800 × 2700 mm deep | 2400 × 3200 mm |
Shaft sizes vary with supplier — the above are indicative and should always be confirmed against the final vendor's shaft drawing before concrete pour. For disabled-access, a car size of at least 1100 × 1400 mm with 900 mm door opening is the working minimum.
5. Lift speed vs building travel height
Speed is selected to keep the round-trip time within the interval target. Indicative bands:
| Travel / floors | Recommended speed |
|---|---|
| Up to G+6 / 18 m | 1.0 m/s |
| G+7 to G+12 / 18–40 m | 1.5 m/s |
| G+13 to G+20 / 40–65 m | 2.0–2.5 m/s |
| G+21 to G+30 / 65–100 m | 2.5–4.0 m/s |
| Above 100 m | 4.0–7.0 m/s (zoned with double-deck or sky lobbies) |
Above 60–70 m rise, geared traction is typically replaced by gearless machines. Above 3.0 m/s, the car needs guide-shoe rollers (not sliders) and the counterweight buffers become oil-hydraulic (not spring). MRL (machine-room-less) systems are well-proven up to about 2.5 m/s and 60 m rise; above that, a dedicated machine room is still the norm.
6. Pit depth and overhead headroom
The structural team needs two numbers from the lift consultant early: pit depth (at the bottom of the shaft, below the lowest stopping floor) and overhead headroom (above the highest stopping floor to the underside of the shaft slab). Indicative minima:
| Speed | Minimum pit depth | Minimum overhead |
|---|---|---|
| 1.0 m/s | 1.4–1.6 m | 3.8–4.2 m |
| 1.5 m/s | 1.6–1.8 m | 4.2–4.6 m |
| 2.0 m/s | 1.8–2.0 m | 4.6–4.8 m |
| 2.5 m/s | 2.0–2.3 m | 4.8–5.2 m |
| 4.0 m/s | 2.3–2.8 m | 5.5–6.5 m |
Pit waterproofing is mandatory in coastal / high-water-table sites — a flooded pit is a recurring maintenance cost. Ladder or fixed vertical access into the pit is required per IS 14665. Machine-room dimensions (for geared / gearless MR traction) are typically about 1.5 times the shaft footprint with 2.2–2.8 m headroom depending on machine size.
7. Fireman's lift — the mandatory high-rise provision
Per NBC 2016 Part 4, a fireman's lift is mandatory in every building taller than 15 m (some State rules set the trigger at 30 m for residential). Its requirements, detailed in Part 8 Section 5 and IS 14665 Part 4:
- Minimum car capacity 8 passengers / 544 kg; travel the full height of the building; car size at least 1100 × 1400 mm to take a stretcher.
- Shaft fire-rated for 120 minutes; separate from other passenger-lift shafts.
- Dedicated power supply from a point upstream of the main LT panel, with changeover to DG backup.
- “Fireman's Switch” at the ground-floor lift lobby that recalls the car to the fire-access level and places it under manual control.
- Signage “Fireman's Lift” at every floor entry.
- Operable under smoke conditions — pressurised shaft or smoke-protected lobby access.
- Maximum travel time from top to bottom under 60 seconds — sets a minimum speed (typically 1.0 m/s for G+10, 1.5–2.0 m/s for G+20).
During normal operation, the fireman's lift serves as a regular passenger lift. It only switches into fireman-control mode when the Fireman's Switch is activated or the fire-alarm system commands recall.
8. Escalators — angle, speed, step width
Escalators are the default solution for high-throughput vertical movement over 2–5 floors — retail malls, metro stations, transit interchanges. Part 8 Section 5 and IS 4591 prescribe:
| Parameter | Value |
|---|---|
| Angle of inclination | 30° standard; 35° max for rises up to 6 m |
| Speed | 0.5 m/s standard; 0.65 m/s for high-duty installations; 0.75 m/s maximum |
| Step width | 600 mm (single), 800 mm (general), 1000 mm (heavy-duty / transit) |
| Balustrade height | 900–1100 mm above step nose |
| Rise per unit (practical) | Up to 6 m per escalator (single run); multi-stage for higher |
| Floor-to-floor span needed | Horizontal run = rise × tan(90° − angle) + entry / exit flats |
| Handling capacity | ~4,500 pph (600 mm / 0.5 m/s); ~9,000 pph (1000 mm / 0.65 m/s) |
| Entry / exit flat steps | Minimum 2 flat steps at each end; 3 for 0.65 m/s units |
Combplate, skirt-brush, emergency-stop buttons, handrail-speed-matching sensor, and step-missing detection are mandatory safety devices. Escalators in fire-compartmented buildings must have a fire-rated shutter or a compartmentation arrangement at the escalator opening — this is a common NOC-stage issue in malls.
9. Worked example — lift count for a G+20 office tower
A working example (indicative — every project needs its own traffic simulation):
- Building: G+20 office tower, 20 occupied office floors, 950 m² net per floor, office density 1 person per 10 m².
- Total population: 20 × 95 = 1,900 persons.
- Design peak-hour population (90%): 1,710.
- Handling target: 13% in 5 minutes = 222 persons per 5 min.
- Car selected: 16-passenger (1088 kg), 80% loaded = 13 persons per trip.
- Round-trip time target (RTT): 120–140 s at 2.5 m/s for this travel height (65 m).
- Cars needed: (222 ÷ 13) × (140 ÷ 300) ≈ 8 cars in the up-peak service. One of these is the fireman's lift.
- Zoning: 4 cars serving floors 1–10, 4 cars serving floors 11–20 — improves interval and reduces RTT.
The same building with a 10-passenger car selection would need 12–13 cars — prohibitive in core footprint. Which is why choosing the car size and speed early is the single biggest lever on the core design.
10. Differences between NBC Part 8 Section 5 and international lift codes
| Provision | NBC 2016 Part 8 Sec 5 / IS 14665 | ASME A17.1 / EN 81 |
|---|---|---|
| Standards lineage | IS 14665 (aligned with EN 81 over successive revisions) | EN 81-20/50 (Europe); ASME A17.1 (US) |
| Fireman's lift | Mandatory >15 m (State-dependent) | EN 81-72 firefighters' lift; ASME A17.1 Firefighter's Emergency Operation |
| Safety gear | Progressive / instantaneous per IS 14665 Pt 1 | EN 81-20 types; ASME A17.1 Part 2 |
| Machine-room-less | Recognised in post-2016 amendments | EN 81-20 fully accommodates MRL |
| Periodic inspection | State Lift Act + IS 14665 (half-yearly / annual) | ASME A17.2 inspection; EN 81 + national regs (6–12 month cycle) |
11. State-level variations — Lift Acts
Installing and operating a lift in India is additionally governed by State Lift and Escalator Acts. These prescribe licensing of the operator, periodic inspection by a licensed inspector, and registration with the State Electrical Inspectorate. Variations:
- Maharashtra Lifts Act — licensing through PWD Electrical Inspectorate; inspection half-yearly.
- Tamil Nadu Lifts and Escalators Act 1997 — registration, annual renewal.
- Karnataka Lifts Act — Electrical Inspectorate approval for design drawings before installation.
- Delhi Lifts & Escalators Act 1942 (updated) — Electrical Inspectorate approval; licensed contractor required.
- Telangana, Gujarat, West Bengal — similar regimes under respective Lift Rules.
Design drawings must typically be submitted for State Electrical Inspectorate approval before shaft construction is finalised. This is separate from municipal building sanction.
12. What changed from earlier editions
- Recognition of machine-room-less (MRL) lift configurations.
- Explicit accessibility provisions for universal-access lifts (door width, car dimensions, tactile floor numbering, audible annunciation).
- Strengthened fireman's-lift specifications aligned with updated Part 4.
- Updated escalator safety requirements — skirt-brush, handrail-speed-match, step-missing detection.
- Pulled through IS 14665 revisions for safety-gear categories and over-speed governor requirements.
13. Cross-references — IS codes and other NBC parts
- IS 14665 Part 1 — outline dimensions of passenger, goods, service and hospital lifts
- IS 14665 Part 2 — lift car internal dimensions and door openings
- IS 14665 Part 3 — safety rules (design, installation and testing)
- IS 14665 Part 4 — fireman's lift (aligned with EN 81-72)
- IS 14665 Part 5 — inspection manual
- IS 4591 — escalators
- IS 15259 — moving walks
- NBC 2016 Part 4 — fireman's lift trigger points and fire-shaft construction
- NBC 2016 Part 8 Section 2 — electrical and allied installations (lift power supply)
- NBC 2016 Part 3 — lift-lobby sizing for circulation
14. Practical compliance tips
- Bring the lift consultant in at concept. Shaft count and size dictate the core geometry — this is not a post-structure exercise.
- Run a traffic simulation. Don't rely on “thumb rules.” A simulation at concept stage pays for itself ten times over.
- Standardise car sizes across the scheme. Identical shafts mean interchangeable equipment and lower maintenance cost.
- Don't under-specify the fireman's lift. It is the regulatory gate — make it meet Part 4 at concept, not in a rushed change order.
- Pit waterproofing. Specify a sump pump with float switch in every pit. Flooded pits cause 80% of non-mechanical lift failures.
- Overhead check. The shaft slab soffit can be boxed out for counterweight buffers — confirm with the vendor before finalising the top-floor slab.
- Separate power feed for the fireman's lift. Tap upstream of the main LT panel; route cables through fire-rated shafts.
- Escalator combplate alignment. Insist on site inspection at commissioning — a 3 mm misalignment is a common cause of clothing-trap incidents.
- Universal access. Minimum one lift per building accessible to wheelchair users — 1100 × 1400 mm car with 900 mm door opening and Braille floor buttons.
- Commissioning records. No-load run, rated-load run, over-speed governor test, safety-gear trip, emergency stop — every test logged and signed by the licensed inspector.
15. FAQ — NBC 2016 Part 8 Section 5
How many lifts does a G+10 residential building need?
Two passenger lifts minimum, one of which must be the fireman's lift (above 15 m height). With 20 flats per floor and two 10-passenger lifts at 1.5 m/s, interval works out to around 75–90 s — adequate for residential. A simulation is still recommended.
What speed should a G+20 office tower use?
Typically 2.0–2.5 m/s for the main banks, zoned low-rise / high-rise. A single bank of slow lifts breaks the 5-minute handling target at this height. For a worked sizing, see Section 9 of this article.
Is a machine-room mandatory under NBC?
No — machine-room-less (MRL) configurations are recognised. For speeds above roughly 2.5 m/s or rises above 60 m, a dedicated machine room is usually still specified.
What's the minimum size of a fireman's lift?
Minimum 8-passenger / 544 kg capacity, car size at least 1100 × 1400 mm so a stretcher can be loaded. Shaft fire-rated for 120 minutes, dedicated power supply, Fireman's Switch at the ground-floor lobby.
What's the maximum escalator angle allowed?
30° is the standard angle; 35° is permitted for rises up to 6 m. Above that rise, a single escalator at 35° is not acceptable — split into two runs with a landing.
How often must a lift be inspected?
State Lift Acts generally mandate half-yearly or annual inspection by a licensed Electrical Inspector. The installer / maintenance contractor runs monthly preventive maintenance. IS 14665 Part 5 is the inspection-procedure reference. Major items inspected include safety-gear function, over-speed governor, brake performance, door-reopening safety, and emergency-call system.