Commercial Wheelchair Lifts in Harrisburg, PA

Commercial lifts we have installed in Harrisburg

Heart Ministries in Harrisburg asked for a way to bring a member in a wheelchair onto the platform at the front of the sanctuary. We installed an Ascension Protege stage lift: it sits on the finished floor, carries up to 900 lb, and raises its guard with the platform, so there was no pit to cut and no ramp across the room. The lift was permitted through the Pennsylvania Department of Labor and Industry and tested in front of the inspector before the congregation used it.

The photo on this page is another Harrisburg installation: an enclosed Savaria V-1504 serving a raised platform in a building the public uses, with an interlocked door, the fire signage the code calls for, and a call station at the lower landing. Those two jobs cover the two most common Harrisburg requests, a stage or chancel lift and an enclosed lift to a raised or lowered level, and we have a reference for each.

Buildings and neighborhoods we see most

Churches: the large brick congregations along Market Street and Derry Street in Allison Hill, the stone churches of Uptown and Riverside, and the newer sanctuaries toward Colonial Park and Linglestown, nearly all with a raised chancel and a fellowship hall below. Offices and practices: Front Street and Second Street townhouses converted to law offices and medical practices, with a porch and four to six steps at the door and a basement office a half flight down. Nonprofits and civic buildings: agencies around the Capitol complex and in Midtown, social halls in Steelton and Paxtang, libraries and senior centers in the suburbs. Schools: district buildings from several decades joined together, with a cafetorium stage or a split-level wing.

Harrisburg also sends us families who have just been discharged from UPMC Harrisburg or Penn State Health Holy Spirit, but those are residential jobs; for porch lifts at a Harrisburg home see platform lifts in Harrisburg.

Lift options for Harrisburg buildings

Chancels and stages: Ascension Protege up to 42 inches and Virtuoso up to 60 inches, no pit, no ramp, as at Heart Ministries. Entrances: an enclosed outdoor Savaria V-1504 on a pad beside the stoop, with interlocked doors at the sidewalk and the landing; the Ascension Clarity where a finished glass look matters on a Front Street facade. Half flights and basements: the V-1504 with the commercial package in a framed hoistway, up to 14 feet of travel, or the Prolift enclosed cab for a lobby. Straight stairs with no floor space: the Savaria Delta inclined lift. Under about 30 inches: usually a modular ramp, which we also install and will price alongside the lift.

What it costs in Harrisburg, and why not an elevator

Harrisburg is inside our closest service ring, so there is no travel charge for the site visit or the installation. A commercial platform lift costs more than a residential porch lift, which typically runs in the low to mid five figures installed, because of the enclosure, the interlocked doors, and the state permit and inspection. It is still a fraction of a LULA or passenger elevator, which would need a hoistway with a deep pit, a machine room, and fire-rated construction in buildings that often sit on 1900s stone foundations. The lift is installed in two to five days; the elevator is a construction project. We give a written quote within 24 hours of the visit with the permit and initial inspection as their own line. Our post on vertical platform lift cost lists the factors.

Permits and inspection in the city and Dauphin County

Every commercial lift in Harrisburg follows ASME A18.1 as adopted by the Pennsylvania Uniform Construction Code. We file the Department of Labor and Industry permit and drawings before the lift is ordered, prepare the local building permit package for the city's codes office or the township's code official, install, perform the acceptance test while a certified elevator inspector witnesses it, and handle the Certificate of Operation. Periodic inspections follow, and our service plans include them. The ADA Standards also shape the lift: usable without an attendant, unassisted entry and exit, reachable controls. Because the inspectors who cover Dauphin County are the ones we work with most, scheduling the witnessed test is routine. Read more about permits for a wheelchair lift.

Drive time and scheduling

Harrisburg is about 15 minutes from our shop in Etters, PA. We group commercial site visits with our regular routes, so a visit in Harrisburg is usually available within a few days, and the written quote follows within 24 hours. Nearby towns we cover from the same route: Camp Hill, Mechanicsburg, Hummelstown, Hershey, Steelton, Middletown, Linglestown, Colonial Park.

Start at the overview: commercial wheelchair lifts covers the lineup, the code, and the permit process in one place.

Commercial lifts in other cities

• Commercial wheelchair lifts in Lancaster, PA
• Commercial wheelchair lifts in York, PA

By building type

• Wheelchair lifts for churches
• Wheelchair lifts for schools
• Wheelchair lifts for businesses
• Wheelchair lifts for municipal buildings
• Inclined platform lifts

Everything else we do in Harrisburg: Stairlifts in Harrisburg, Home elevators in Harrisburg, Residential platform lifts in Harrisburg. Platform lifts for a home porch or deck are on the vertical platform lifts page, and ramps on the modular ramps page.