Wny does it take so long to climb up and down the Silo?

Apologies in advance if this has already been asked and answered.

I can't figure out why it takes them so long to travel between levels. In Season 1, the mayor and the deputy took days to reach the bottom. It seems like families have to take days off work just to visit relatives.

Even if it takes a minute to walk up a single flight (and I am being incredibly generous here), it would only take 140 minutes to reach the bottom. Let's double that time and assume they rest for a minute on each floor; even then, it would take less than five hours to traverse the entire silo. If anything, they should be faster, having walked up and down those steps all their lives.