Passing Doors

I like holding doors for people.  And by holding doors I mean "passing" doors.  Holding a door implies standing behind it and letting someone else walk in first.  Passing a door is simply holding it open and giving it a good shove as you walk through, making it easier for the next person to enter.

Passing doors is the better option for a few reasons: (1) If you are leading a group of people and decide to hold the door for them, they may not know where to go, and then they have to wait for you to catch up.  (2) If you casually decide to hold the door open for someone, you might get trapped holding it open for a whole group of people, again making anyone you are with wait for you.  (3) Holding a door can lead to situations where people suggest you go through instead - this slows down the entire walking-through-the-door process.  

Overall passing doors is the quicker, easier, most efficient polite option.

If you want to pass a door to someone, a problem can arise if they aren't directly behind you.  If they are too far off, it would be awkward (and in certain times of the year not energy efficient) to hold a door open for a while.  There is a certain area that is right on the edge of being appropriate to wait for someone, comparable to a yellow stoplight.

The diagram below gives an overhead view of a door and the surrounding area.  It would be appropriate to pass a door to person A, but not to person C.  However, person B could go either way.  If you wait too long thinking about it, person B might enter the green zone, making it awkward to close the door on them.  Usually the best option is to not worry about it since they can probably open the door on their own.