An illustrative example embodiment of an elevator system includes a destination entry device configured to allow a passenger to indicate an intended destination prior to entering an elevator car and at least one detector configured to detect a proximity between the passenger and at least one other individual that has not indicated an intended destination. A controller is configured to determine whether the detected proximity between the passenger and the at least one other individual satisfies at least one criterion indicating that the at least one other individual likely is associated with the passenger, will board an elevator car with the passenger, and will travel to the intended destination with the passenger. The controller is configured to assign an elevator car to carry the passenger and the at least one other individual to the intended destination when the detected proximity satisfies the at least one criterion.

To make it possible to comprehensively predict the movement of people by associating an elevator control system in a facility such as a building and an external system other than this system with each other and thereby provide a new service that has not existed before. There is provided an elevator operation management system for controlling and managing multiple elevator devices in a facility, the system including: a reception unit that acquires information on the number of users to use the elevator devices and elevator car destination information; a learning unit that stores and learns, as past experience data, the information on the number of users and the elevator car destination information acquired from the reception unit; a per-floor number-of-people estimation unit that estimates the number of users getting off at each elevator hall floor using storage information of the learning unit; and a request information output unit that outputs the number of people getting off thus estimated in the facility to a system other than the elevator operation management system.

Devices, methods and computer programs for elevator call allocation with stochastic multi-objective optimization are disclosed. At least some of the disclosed embodiments allow an elevator group control to take into account knowledge about possible future passenger arrivals when allocating new calls. At the same time, the new elevator calls can be allocated via optimizing multiple objectives, such as the waiting time, the time to destination, and/or the energy consumption. In other words, the invention makes it possible to both take into account the uncertainty related to future passengers and control the trade-off between different optimization objectives.

A method of operating an elevator call control system comprising: receiving a first elevator call from a first individual carrying a first mobile device, the first elevator call including a destination request to travel from a first boarding floor to a first destination floor; determining that the first individual carrying the first mobile device is traveling with a second individual, wherein the second individual is traveling to a second destination floor; assigning an elevator car to the first elevator call; and scheduling the elevator car to transport the first individual carrying the first mobile device and the second individual together to at least one of a first destination floor and the second destination floor.

A method for operating an elevator system that includes an elevator car movable between landings in response to an elevator call registered by an elevator control unit. The method includes determining a special operating mode of the elevator system, the special operating mode being different from a nominal operating mode at least with respect to a characteristic of use of the elevator car, and operating, in the special operating mode, the elevator system so as to reduce a number of passengers entering the elevator car from the landing compared to the nominal operating mode based on the characteristic.

Methods and systems for controlling elevator systems are provided. The methods include receiving inputs from at least one interactive input device, wherein the inputs include elevator call requests, tracking one or more people located within a monitored area using at least one sensor, assigning elevator assignments to the one or more people based on at least one of the inputs from the at least one interactive input device and a grouping algorithm based on the tracking of the one or more people, and scheduling operation of at least one elevator car based on the elevator assignments.

According to an aspect, there is provided a method and an apparatus. In the solution, an elevator call indication associated with a user is obtained. First guidance information is caused to be provided for the user to proceed to a waiting area. Location data associated with the user is obtained, the location data providing information about the location of the user. An elevator car is allocated in response to the elevator call indication, wherein the allocation takes into account the location of the user.

Embodiments include a system and method for controlling doors in a multi-door system. Embodiments a controller configured to control the multi-door system, wherein the multi-door system includes a first door and a second door, wherein the first door is on a different side than the second door, and one or more sensors operably coupled to the multi-door system and the controller, wherein the one or more sensors are configured to detect one or more conditions. The controller includes a processor, wherein the processor is configured to receive an input from the one or more sensors, wherein the input comprises at least one of call information and crowd sensing information, responsive to the input, prioritize an operation of the first door and the second door based at least in part on the input, and operate the first door and second door based on the prioritization.

An illustrative example embodiment of a method of managing risk associated with at least one individual moving within a building includes: determining a beginning location and a destination of an individual, wherein the beginning location and the destination are on different levels of the building; determining a risk contribution of the individual based on an indication of at least one characteristic of the individual; determining a plurality of routes between the beginning location and the destination; determining a risk factor of each of the plurality of routes based on the risk contribution of the individual and other risk information regarding the respective routes; and determining a recommended route from among the plurality of routes for the individual to arrive at the destination, wherein the risk factor of the recommended route is lower than the risk factor of at least one other one of the plurality of routes.

A method of controlling an elevator system incudes collecting one or more frustration indicators of a passenger during usage of the elevator system by the passenger; collecting one or more frustration factors; correlating the one or more frustration factors to the one or more frustration indicators to generate one or more preferences for the passenger; generating a profile for the passenger in response to the correlating, the profile including the one or more preferences; and controlling operation of the elevator system in response to the one or more preferences to reduce frustration of the passenger during interaction with the elevator system.