Stairs are used to access different levels of a building.
They use individual steps that are assembled with mathematical
precision, to provide comfortable access for people who live in multiple
story buildings. The picture below provides you with an excellent
example of a stairway that's used to transport people from the bottom
floor of their home, to the upper floor.
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Stairs come in a variety of different shapes and sizes
and don't forget lengths. The Niesenbahn funicular railway near Spiez,
Switzerland, has 11,674 steps and reaches a height of over 5000 feet.
Now that's a long set of stairs. The average stairway for a two-story
home uses 13 steps.
If we broke the longest stairway down in the world, into 13 step,
individual stairways, we would have almost 900 sets of stairs. If you
live in a two-story home, walk up and down your stairs 900 times, to get
an idea of how long it would take you to climb up and down the stairway.
Stairs can be made out of wood, metal, blocks, bricks, rocks, concrete
and even glass. They come in a variety of different designs and can be
used in most buildings.
Stairways have been used for centuries and I would imagine that they
will be used well into the future. The designs haven't changed much from
the early days, even though creative architects and designers have
produced some incredible looking staircases. Some of them actually look
like pieces of art, when they're finished.
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