Intermediate floor of the Eiffel tower

The middle floor is a "ghost floor" which lies between the 2^nd floor and the 3^rd.

Intermediate floor

We see it when we look carefully at the tower from a distance. This platform is unused nowadays, although it still exists and can be physically reached, but it is not one of the normal lifts stops. However lifts have the possibility to stop there, if necessary, what they never need to do.

How to get to the middle floor?

We do not go up there, simply. This floor is closed to the public.

What is it for?

Nowadays, for nothing, but it has been used from the commissioning of the Edoux lifts to its final stop. This elevator, provided to Gustave Eiffel by the company Edoux, leading the visitors of the tower from the 2nd to the 3rd floor, but in 1889 no one was able to build a lift that climbed 160m at a time, at this altitude, in the so special constraints of the Eiffel Tower. It was therefore necessary to install two elevators, one on the intermediate floor, the other on this floor to the top. The intermediate platform was used to tranship passengers in the middle of the climb.

This elevator was not replaced until 1983, when it provided a poor service as it was fed by a hydraulic circuit, the water froze regularly in winter and it became unusable. In addition, passenger transhipment is an impractical, time-consuming operation that limits the number of people who can climb to the top. His stoppage in 1983 was therefore good news, especially since it was replaced by two sets of double-cabins, with a much higher efficiency.

So nowadays, the intermediate platform no longer has any function, but it has not been dismantled.

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