elevator-core

From a 5-story office to a space elevator — same engine, same API.

An engine-agnostic, tick-based elevator simulation library for Rust.
Plug it into Bevy, Unity, your own renderer, or run headless.

Guide · API Reference · Examples · Changelog

What it does

You define stops at arbitrary positions on a 1-D axis, spawn riders, and call step(). The engine handles dispatch, trapezoidal motion, doors, boarding, and metrics — your code just reacts to events.

use elevator_core::prelude::*;
use elevator_core::config::ElevatorConfig;

fn main() -> Result<(), SimError> {
    let mut sim = SimulationBuilder::new()
        .stop(StopId(0), "Lobby", 0.0)
        .stop(StopId(1), "Floor 2", 4.0)
        .stop(StopId(2), "Floor 3", 8.0)
        .elevator(ElevatorConfig { starting_stop: StopId(0), ..Default::default() })
        .build()?;

    sim.spawn_rider(StopId(0), StopId(2), 75.0)?;

    loop {
        sim.step();
        for event in sim.drain_events() {
            if let Event::RiderExited { rider, tick, .. } = event {
                println!("Tick {tick}: rider {rider:?} delivered!");
                return Ok(());
            }
        }
    }
}

cargo run --example basic -p elevator-core   # try it now

Use cases

Scenario	How
Office building with 5 floors	Stops at 0, 4, 8, 12, 16
Skyscraper with sky lobbies	Multi-group dispatch, express zones
Space elevator	Stops at 0 and 1,000,000 — same engine
Player-controlled car	`ServiceMode::Manual` + velocity commands
Custom AI dispatch	Implement `DispatchStrategy::rank()`
VIP passengers, cargo, robots	Extension storage — attach any data

Features

Arbitrary stop positions: not limited to uniform floors; model buildings, towers, orbital tethers
Pluggable dispatch: built-in SCAN, LOOK, Nearest Car, ETD, Destination; or bring your own via the DispatchStrategy trait
Rider lifecycle: Waiting → Boarding → Riding → Exiting → Arrived/Abandoned, with hooks at each transition
Extension storage: attach arbitrary typed data to riders, elevators, and stops
O(1) population queries: who's waiting, riding, or resident at any stop, instantly
Deterministic replay: same inputs produce the same simulation every time
Snapshot save/load: serialize full simulation state for replays or networking
Metrics: wait times, ride times, throughput, delivered counts, all built-in

Non-goals

This is a simulation library, not a game. It deliberately does not include:

Rendering or UI — wrap it with Bevy, Unity (FFI), or anything else
AI passengers or traffic generation — use the optional traffic feature flag, or drive arrivals yourself
Building layout or 2-D floor plans — the sim is 1-D by design

Visual demo

The workspace includes a Bevy frontend that renders the simulation in 2-D:

cargo run                                       # default 5-stop building
cargo run -- assets/config/space_elevator.ron    # 1,000 km orbital tether

Feature flags

Flag	Default	Adds
`traffic`	yes	Poisson arrivals, daily traffic patterns. Pulls in `rand`.
`energy`	no	Per-elevator energy/regen modeling.

License

MIT or Apache 2.0, at your option.

elevator-core 15.1.0