AUGUSTA — Mayor David Rollins recently had 10 or 15 minutes of unplanned quiet time to himself at city hall.

He was stuck in the elevator between the first and second floors on Monday.

“I enjoyed a good 10-minute solitary confinement,” Rollins said. “It was a good Zen moment.”

Rollins, who was a bit late to his regular Monday meeting with City Manager William Bridgeo, was alone at the time, but he is not the only one to be trapped in the Augusta City Center’s elevator.

Development Director Matt Nazar said there have been about a half dozen similar incidents over the last nine months, including one when a janitor moving cleaning equipment between floors was trapped at night for 30 or 40 minutes and had to call the Fire Department in to open the door because no one else was around.

City councilors recently voted unanimously to spend up to $100,000 to get the elevator, which was installed when the building was built 30 years ago, running reliably again.

Bridgeo said the cost is high because the elevator is so old replacement parts no longer are available. So just about all the mechanical parts must be replaced with modern gear.

That includes $15,000 to $25,000 to upgrade electrical equipment and fire detection equipment, and to install in a heat pump to cool the server for the elevator’s new computerized controls.

In recent months, Bridgeo said, the elevator occasionally has become stuck between floors.

“It’s unreliable. We just don’t know when it won’t work,” Bridgeo said. “Though when it fails, it’s just a matter of resetting it, which takes about 10 minutes.”

Repairs probably will take about two months, during which time the elevator will be out of service, he said.

However, all three floors still will be accessible without the elevator because Augusta City Center has ground-level entrances on all three floors.

Bridgeo expects work to start on the elevator soon, perhaps as soon as next week.

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