Spiral staircase with a single guardrail once led to the top of the Eiffel Tower

Posted by bookofjoe 4 days ago

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Comments

Comment by sneak 2 days ago

All spiral staircases have a single guardrail. That’s why they aren’t double helix staircases.

Comment by madaxe_again 2 days ago

We call them “spiral staircases” yet rarely do they actually contain a single spiral - but they do have a helix. I guess “helical staircase” was just too much for people to care about as the term embedded in the 1600s. Previously they’d been winding stairs, screw stairs, and earlier yet just a “vice”, so common were they. Weird how language adapts to what’s easy rather than what’s correct.

Comment by layer8 2 days ago

A helix counts as a type of spiral: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_spirals

It also looks like a spiral when looking up or down.

Comment by nkrisc 2 days ago

> Weird how language adapts to what’s easy rather than what’s correct.

It’s not weird at all, it’s quite sensible. The purpose of language between people is not to produce correct sounds, it’s to facilitate some other activity or intent, so people will tend towards whatever manner of language makes achieving their goals the easiest.

It’s the same reason desire paths form: it’s less effort.

Comment by cheschire 2 days ago

If some language conveys meaning successfully, it ultimately doesn’t matter what the rules are.

Comment by technothrasher 2 days ago

The old prescriptive vs descriptive linguistic battle rears its head once again.

Comment by nkrisc 1 day ago

The only languages that don't change are ones that no one uses anymore.

Comment by nottorp 2 days ago

> with no safety barriers

A guardrail isn't a safety barrier? The photos of the staircase don't look like star wars walkways to me at all.

Comment by MithrilTuxedo 2 days ago

Ahhh.... I couldn't figure out why they said that. I forgot the Statue of Liberty had double-helix staircases.

Comment by ianpurton 2 days ago

That site is everything that's wrong with the internet at the moment.

A dizzying array of adverts and popups.

Comment by pwg 2 days ago

Using UblockOrigin, in default deny all javascript mode, the article is fully readable with zero adverts and zero popups.

I had no idea the article even contained any of those until I read your comment.

Comment by chromadon 1 day ago

Does that block all js from running?

Comment by consp 2 days ago

And it was very persistent In should enable those. No thank you.

Comment by tjoff 2 days ago

Not a single popup, didn't find any ads more than a text-only banner on top asking to subscribe. Some whitespace where ads might go though. No adblock.

I'm in EU though, maybe they actually respect GDPR. Or maybe it is just a glitch.

Comment by alehlopeh 1 day ago

I wonder how the plumbing worked for the bathroom in his private office at the top of the tower.

Comment by allan_s 1 day ago

I also wonder how practical it was to climb there, I went to the eiffel tower several times and climbing stairs is an exercice by itself ,especially spiral ones

Comment by 1 day ago

Comment by Andrew2565 2 days ago

As seen in "The Lavender Hill Mob"

Comment by FrustratedMonky 2 days ago

Wasn't the Eiffel Tower built as a temporary exhibition?

Can't believe the resources that took for 'temporary', and that it lasted this long.

Comment by pimlottc 1 day ago

That's part of what makes it impressive. "Our country is so advanced and powerful that we can make a giant tower like this just for a glorified art show"

Comment by bookofjoe 2 days ago

>Eiffel’s contract dictated that the structure would stay up for only 20 years.

Comment by deadbabe 2 days ago

I kind of feel like in the old days, people weren’t really afraid of heights. Heights were fairly new, and exciting, and the consequences of falling were not well understood yet. It’s why you would see skyscraper construction workers jumping around and sitting on beams to enjoy a casual lunch thousands of feet up, without a care in the world.

Comment by fulafel 1 day ago

> Heights were fairly new, and exciting, and the consequences of falling were not well understood yet.

Indeed. Until Herbert Fall wrote his treatise about it in 1902 the entire concept was really absent from our collective imagination.

Comment by tvier 2 days ago

I'm pretty sure people have been falling off things for a quite a while.

Comment by mikestew 1 day ago

…the consequences of falling were not well understood yet

Eh? Cliffs, trees; fall off anything at 10 meters or higher, and your odds of dying are around 50%. I’m pretty sure folks were aware of the consequences long before Eiffel showed up.

Comment by deadbabe 1 day ago

A guy literally jumped off the Eiffel Tower to test an early parachute, ignorant of what would happen if it failed.

Comment by davepdotorg 1 day ago

The fact he was testing a parachute would suggest he was well aware of the consequences.

Comment by yencabulator 1 day ago

Perhaps it was more that risk taking and dying young from various illnesses was a thing that happened around you a lot, so you were more accustomed to it and didn't expect to live to 80.

Comment by mikestew 1 day ago

...ignorant of what would happen if it failed.

Then why was he testing a parachute in the first place? I think he had a better idea than you give him credit for.

Comment by qotgalaxy 1 day ago

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Comment by SV_BubbleTime 2 days ago

Look, I know ads are the mechanism for some sites. And I don’t normally “this site gave my phone cancer”.. but on IOS with blockers, everything except the text on the site can go fuck itself.

Been to the top of the Eiffel, it was a long enough set of elevator rides to flirt with and eventually date a French girl. So that probably wouldn’t have happened on stairs.

Comment by procaryote 2 days ago

FWIW, on android with firefox + ublock origin it's clean from ads.

On iOS with firefox it's filled with ads; with firefox focus it's mostly clean but you get a dismissable "please disable adblocker" style prompt I didn't get on android. I don't know if there's a browser with a good adblocker allowed in iOS walled garden, but I'd be happy for suggestions

Comment by aaronbrethorst 2 days ago

Do you think you might have also broken up if it had only been stairs?

Comment by onetokeoverthe 2 days ago

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Comment by alsetmusic 1 day ago

Well, that certainly wouldn't have overwhelmed my fear of heights. /s

I'd probably physically lock up in a state of panic. My SO had to rescue me on a far less severe stairway last year when I freaked out at a third story height that was kind of open. Imagine what this could do to someone with vertigo.

Comment by aaron695 2 days ago

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