At least your car wasn't at the top floor when that happened. So you didn't have to carry 3,000 pounds of weights up the steps to load the car so it would drift down when you released the brake to get to the controller. I agree with dirt, these should be absolutely illegal. Ridiculous design fueled by greed.

Anyhow, if in that situation you don't need Otis to come out with run buttons, under the service panel board there is terminal strips with all important terminals needed. Safety string, construction run terminals, even terminals to jump more batteries in parallel if the batteries in the controller to lift the brakes are dead.