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The elevator industry quickly came to see the horizontal movement of passengers by moving stairways and sidewalks as an important segment in a broader band of products. However, many passengers needed to be moved further than even a stack of escalators or the longest sidewalks could take them. The industry, not wishing to forgo any involvement with the continuous movement of people, finally returned to the original concept of the high-rise elevator system -- the hoistway was turned over on its side! Elevator-type cars ran on the surface, in many instances utilizing the same, or slightly modified, drive and control systems. The counterbalanced funicular/hill-climber was also tipped over on its side and turned into a shuttle that served well in airports and other locations where batches of passengers needed to be transported, with their luggage, between two points. In other situations, the hoistway was exchanged for a winding track and a levitated car made stops in response to passenger directions. The genesis for the horizontal transport of people in bunches was, no doubt, the streetcar of Frank Sprague who saw moving people horizontally rather than vertically as the first priority when electricity was first being harnessed. The Chicago Columbian Exposition of 1893 relied upon an electric train that looped around the fair grounds, making frequent stops. Thereafter most large expositions envisioned this kind of short-range automated people mover as an answer to dispersing large assemblies of people. The inventions of the elevator industry -- drive machines, controls, fixtures, signals and automatic car doors -- often served their purposes, whether batches of passengers were moved vertically or horizontally!
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