We manufactured and installed this Victoria Chair Lift into a bank in London. This building has 4485 employees and therefore it is essential that disabled access is available to those who need it. It also receives a vast amount of visitors for its museum and therefore by offering disabled access it is an accessible building. This access is situated in a back entrance away from the busy street and therefore users can use this with ease and dignity.
Due to the building being a grade 1 listed building, incorporating disabled access can be difficult. However our Victoria Chair Lift is invisible when not in use and therefore protects the historical and architectural significance. We work with many architects to design disabled access for listed buildings they are renovating.
Disabled Access before Sesame
The Bank of England had been searching for an accessibility solution for a number of years. Its Grade I Listed status plus being situated in a very busy walkway and road in the City of London made it a challenging building to adapt. English Heritage and City of London planners rejected a number of accessibility solutions as they were not sympathetic to the architecture of the building.
Until the Sesame lift was installed, guests in wheelchairs accessed the Bank and Museum via an access door at the rear of the building.
Disabled Access after Sesame
English Heritage and the City of London approved a Sesame Access Victoria Stairlift at the front entrance to the building, in the staircase to the right of the principle entrance.
The Sesame lift was clad in stone to match the rest of the building. Bespoke handrails were installed to complement the heavy iron historic door.
Victoria Chair Lift
The Victoria Chair Lift is a set of vertically retracting stairs with a manual gate at the upper landing.
Dimensions
Minimum horizontal pit length
non applicable
Minimum platform size
1 474 mm x 1 144 mm
Maximum rise
999 mm
Minimum pit depth below lower landing
1 070 mm
Features
The Lift
The Victoria Chair Lift uses our Wheelstop mechanism. A solid stainless steel toe guard that rises around the platform to prevent wheelchair wheels from rolling off the lift. Please see On Lift Barriers for more information.
The lift table can be made to accept any cladding material. The stairs lower to create the platform, therefore the stair cladding makes up most of the lift table finish.
Nominal Platform dimensions for this lift can very due to site requirements. However they are more than or equal to:
1477mm (l) x 1144mm (w) 0 – 999mm (h)
The platform can have a button post for independent control or a removable hand held post that is inserted by a member of staff.
Please see The Lifting Actuator link for more information on the mechanism used to raise and lower the chair lift.
The Stairs
The Victoria Chair Lift has stairs that raise and lower vertically thus removing the requirement for a pit behind the top step riser.
The top step riser is not a moving stair, it is formed as part of the upper landing area. For example, a staircase with 6 risers will have 5 vertically retracting stairs that will lower.
When the stairs lower the surrounding stair profile will be revealed. Typically this is clad in stainless steel as it is not seen when the stairs are in their rest position. This side stair profile houses a locking mechanism that stabilises and supports the stairs when they are in their rest position.
Please see retracting stair technical page for more information.
The Upper Landing Barrier
The Victoria Chair Lift houses manual gate at the upper landing to protect the fall hazard that is created when the stairs retract.
Please see Upper Landing Barriers for more information.
User type
The Victoria Chair Lift is for wheelchair users only. Non wheelchair users are often presented with a wheelchair to travel whilst seated on this wheelchair platform stair lift. Please see on lift barriers for more information.
System Requirements
The Victoria Chair Lift comes with a solid stainless steel skirt below the lift. Please see Concealing the underside of the lift for more information.
For details on the power supply please see the lift power supply.
For general details on the pit depth please see the lift pit. This system has an upper landing rising barrier that requires 1600mm pit depth below upper landing level.
If the surrounding area presents a crush zone the lift table can be fitted with safety edges to detect an obstruction. Please see Crush hazards surrounding the moving lift for more information.
Please see The Sesame Stair Lift Controls for more information on the controls for this style of lift.
Variations to the Victoria Chair Lift
The upper landing manual gate can be replaced with an automatic rising barrier as seen here: Buckingham Listed Building Lift. This lift also shows an example of a permanent button post fixed on the lift rather than a removable hand held post.
If the pit depth is an issue then the horizontally retracting stairs could be used as seen here: Kensington Stairlift
If the layout of the stairs is slightly different please see the Edinburgh Access Lift.