Sustainable personal mobility in Rotterdam 2021

Sustainable personal mobility in Rotterdam 2021

Korteland, R.

Van Dijk, M.B. (mentor)
Beella, S.K. (mentor)
Van den Boogaard, G.A. (mentor)

Industrial Design Engineering

Industrial Design

Master of Science Design for Interaction

2012-03-16

Rotterdam is in the middle of its ‘second rebuilding’. Its modernist and car-friendly character that was so successful in the first rebuilding after the second world war are now blamed for a number of social and economical problems Rotterdam is faced with. The Rotterdam of 2021 is denser than today. Its centre houses more residents and is starting to shake of its car-friendly character to make way for cyclists and pedestrians. By 2021, Rotterdam’s population exists of more than 50% immigrants. Many public spaces and services are privatized and liberalized, offering citizens more, but fragmented choices. Crosslinks between the randstad cities become abundant, expanding the mobility range of citizens. Citizens may react to these developments in two different ways; be overwhelmed by the increasingly complex city and retreat(individual) or welcome the opportunities and diversity it provides (communal). Next to the developments of the city there are also developments within the citizens. On the one hand, there is an ever stronger need for consumption and comfort and a sense of ‘being a client of the city’ (conservative) while on the other hand collaborative consumption is starting to develop and citizens are increasingly participants in the city rather than consumers or clients (progressive). Two concepts were developed to facilitate the individual-conservative and communal-progressive paradigms in public transport. The individual-conservative paradigm can be characterized by a need for being in their comfort-zone while mobile, an anxiety free state of mind. The busy urban environment threatens to take them out of this zone. Therefore, a concept was developed to allow people to stay in their comfort zone in public transport by being able to detach themselves from the busy urban streets. This concept features a double-decker tram, stops that provide good overview over the city and private seats that clearly demarcate personal space. The first floor of the stops is designed as a small ‘park’, providing the individual-conservative with small oases at regular intervals in the city. The communal progressive paradigm enjoys being mobile, likes to discover new places and meet new people and is willing to take responsibility for the livability of the city. The concept developed for this paradigm aims at allowing people to take responsibility for each other, meet new people and travel more efficiently by establishing synergy between users of public transport. The concept consists of a smartphone application that allows users to add requests to public transport lines, stops or vehicles. Other users can respond to the request and further arrangements are made. An example could be that a user requests another user to share doing groceries with, saving both users valuable time.

mobility
sustainable
Masters that Matter

http://resolver.tudelft.nl/uuid:86565a12-8b48-40a7-bf31-6bc7436a0106

Campus only

Student theses

master thesis

(c) 2012 Korteland, R.