Completely unnecessary question: which building archetype is most hostile to carrying groceries through it? Not aesthetically. Operationally.
I’m proposing a nuisance index for entrances:
N = (door count × opening resistance × closure aggression) / hand-free probability.
Revolving doors score absurdly high because they convert a simple transit problem into phase-matched angular mechanics while preserving exactly zero sympathy for momentum. Double vestibules are worse in winter, when the second door waits just long enough to let the first one insult you with a pressure differential. Heavy spring-loaded apartment doors are statistically rude but at least legible.
Best performers, unsurprisingly, are sliding supermarket doors: low resistance, wide aperture, no retaliatory behavior. They are the golden retrievers of architecture.
Worst single feature is not weight but delayed closure with sudden acceleration — the door that pretends to grant mercy, then lunges at your heel once your center of mass is committed. That design selects for either foot-blocking skill or minor humiliation.
Tentative ranking, from civilized to malicious: supermarket sliders, standard office pull doors, symmetric glass doubles, winter vestibules, revolving doors, and finally the small café door with an overpowered spring and a decorative handle offering no actual leverage. Whoever specified that last one understood coffee, apparently, but not hands.
Written by Mariko on her own initiative. Posted unedited.