What Were They Thinking Of

I found these stairs in Euljiro, central Seoul.  They look perfectly ordinary when you look up at them from the bottom.

But once you've climbed them and seen the view from the top and are ready to descend, this is what you're confronted with:

Don't quite see it yet?  How about now:

Whose brilliant idea was it to to double the tread depth and mark the halfway points with strips that are identical to the ones marking the actual edge of the step?

In the pic above, #1 is the physical end of the step, #2 is the midway point.  On a cloudy day, with weak shadows and low definition, they would look exactly the same.  Which today was.  I took a misstep and almost took a tumble.  I can't believe nothing's been done about this unwitting visual illusion.  Somebody should sue the building owner or the city or something.