Stations
Pointing the way to customer satisfaction
Wayfinding in stations is key to the passenger experience and can also minimise overcrowding and disruption during peak times, as David Watts, managing director of British design and ergonomics company, CCD, explains.
That is why Network Rail (NR) has put the needs of passengers, staff and pedestrians at the heart of the planning process for the London Bridge station redevelopment which will see an increase in capacity from 50 million to 90 million passengers when it is finished in 2018. London Bridge is already Britain’s
E
fourth busiest station, and also one of the most complex as the interchange hub for Thameslink, mainline services to southeast England, London Underground, buses, taxis, bicycles, river-taxis and local pedestrians. The new design provides more space for passengers through a new concourse at street level and a reconfigured track with nine through and six terminating platforms. To accommodate this growth, NR is adopting a wayfinding strategy ahead of the detailed station design. NR hopes that this will help minimise bottlenecks and overcrowding, particularly during
IRJ September 2013
NSURING passenger satisfaction should be a primary objective for railway operators.
high peak passenger flows and unexpected disruptions. The objective is to achieve an effective wayfinding system which will help create a positive experience for railway passengers at the first and last point of contact with the railway. This will reduce stress for inexperienced passengers who fear the unknown, experienced commuters who worry about delays, or international travellers who have to cope with a different culture, a foreign language and an unfamiliar environment. To be clear, wayfinding encompasses
far more than signage which is usually considered as a design exercise towards the end of the process. It is in fact the process by which a navigation strategy evolves from identifying how people will pass through and interact with an environment. While the station building might be designed with people in mind, support is required to help people find their way. The three key components of
wayfinding are: orientation, direction giving, and decision making. Passengers need to make sense of the
station space as they enter it and then be given the information they need as they pass through. This is a particular challenge in spaces that have evolved over time or have complex layouts. Even when London Bridge is finished it will remain a complicated space with one new main concourse, plus the original concourse at the base of The Shard - currently Europe’s tallest building - for terminating trains. The re- engineering of the space means that for the first time passengers will have direct access to all platforms from a main central concourse.
Strategy
By creating the wayfinding strategy early in the development, NR aims to
achieve a number of benefits : getting it right first time to avoid retrofitting which is often a messy solution that could ruin the architecture
and result in poor wayfinding cost saving - early consideration
should result in fewer signs, and an integrated solution with ground
51
Page 1 |
Page 2 |
Page 3 |
Page 4 |
Page 5 |
Page 6 |
Page 7 |
Page 8 |
Page 9 |
Page 10 |
Page 11 |
Page 12 |
Page 13 |
Page 14 |
Page 15 |
Page 16 |
Page 17 |
Page 18 |
Page 19 |
Page 20 |
Page 21 |
Page 22 |
Page 23 |
Page 24 |
Page 25 |
Page 26 |
Page 27 |
Page 28 |
Page 29 |
Page 30 |
Page 31 |
Page 32 |
Page 33 |
Page 34 |
Page 35 |
Page 36 |
Page 37 |
Page 38 |
Page 39 |
Page 40 |
Page 41 |
Page 42 |
Page 43 |
Page 44 |
Page 45 |
Page 46 |
Page 47 |
Page 48 |
Page 49 |
Page 50 |
Page 51 |
Page 52 |
Page 53 |
Page 54 |
Page 55 |
Page 56 |
Page 57 |
Page 58 |
Page 59 |
Page 60 |
Page 61 |
Page 62 |
Page 63 |
Page 64