Abstract: An elevator car having a clutch pivotally carried by a car door and biased to an operative position in which drive rollers of an adjacent hatch door may be engaged by "open" and "close" vanes. A first parallelogram linkage operates the close vane in direct response to car door position, in a direction opposite to initial car door opening movement. A second parallelogram linkage, associated with the open vane, is operated when the open vane contacts a hatch door roller at the start of door opening, to unlock the car door by retracting a plunger from an opening in the car door sill. The car door clutch bias may be manually overcome by authorized maintenance personnel, to disengage the car door from a hatch door.