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Praxis II Showcase 2009 at U of T

When:  Wednesday, April 15 from 9:00 am to 7:00 pm

Where:  Bahen Centre Lobby, 40 St. George Street

What:  First year engineering students spent half a term identifying and researching issues of usability, accessibility, and sustainability within the TTC system.  This led to 80 “Requests for Proposals (RFPs)” of which the top six were selected as design challenges to be solved during the second half of the course.

Topics:

  • Improving Passenger Safety Near TTC’s Exposed Subway Tracks
  • Solving the Heat Loss Problem
  • Improving Wayfinding Signage on the TTC
  • Service Delays Caused by the inefficiency of Passenger Dynamics Into and Out Of Subway Cars
  • Revising TTC Bus Interiors to Maximise Space and Boost Passenger Satisfaction
  • Improving the Emergency Response System on the TTC Subways to Decrease Delay Time and Increase Safety

For more information, please see the full invitation.

12 thoughts on “Praxis II Showcase 2009 at U of T”

  1. I definitely want to publish this to our website. Im glad to see that there is a lot of hands-on learning opportunities for students.

    I can already see that 3 of the projects will be of immediate interest to public transport operators.

    I so wish that I could attend but I hope that you can publish reports / summaries / observations here Steve.

    Cheers,

    Moaz Yusuf Ahmad
    Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia

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  2. One item I would like the TTC to improve is their bus stop signs. I moved here to Toronto from Vancouver and one thing I would like the TTC to improve is their bus stop signs. At every bus stop that I used in Vancouver the sign tells you which bus or buses stop at that particular stop. It is handy when I was travelling to unfamiliar parts of that town and the bus stops themselves are very user friendly by being informative. I think the TTC is great but their are always things that need to be improved. The TTC already has particular bus route signs at the subway stations I go to and it would be nice if they implemented this throughout the TTC’s network.

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  3. “Revising TTC Bus Interiors to Maximise Space and Boost Passenger Satisfaction”

    It’s the little things. If you are in brampton and ride an LFS bus (the ones with the curvy front) and you sit at the far back rear corner, you quickly find out that no matter how you sit, there is a nice 90 degree edge that feels like a razor poking into your back. Sit in the same rear-corner seat of a Toronto RTS bus (curvy front, incandescent blue lights at the top) and not only does the roof touch your head, but there is some sort of pipe sticking into your knee. Ride a TTC D40LF (low floor, incandescent blue lights at the top) and sit against the window, in the high floor section, just behind the door, and you find an inch to squeeze your shoulder into. Ride a TTC Orion VII (LED blue lights at the top) and you find this inch is non-existent.

    I’m not certain you can “solve” the problems, as the bus-manufacturing companies already spend millions trying to come up with the best bus. Perhaps a closer look at so-called T vs so-called “side” engine placement is worth it, as the more popular “T” design actually takes up a row of seats at the very back of the bus.

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  4. I agree with George S – bus stop information could be improved. At very least there should be a list of routes from that stop, arrival times and travel times to key destinations downstream. (Amazingly, TTC don’t publish journey times anywhere).

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  5. “Revising TTC Bus Interiors to Maximise Space and Boost Passenger Satisfaction”

    That’s a lesson un-learned in Toronto.

    I am young enough, barely, to still be called young, but also old enough to remember that, in the early and the mid-1980s, some GM New Looks had different seating arrangements and different seat types because the TTC had been experimenting with layout for successive orders in the late 1970s.

    The TTC supposedly learned back then that having a narrow aisle behind the exit doors was awful for passenger circulation and Toronto ended up with a common layout for future orders of Western Flyers, New Flyers, Flyers, GM Classics, and Orion high floors. Torontonians became used to this amount of space.

    It’s a shame that the TTC was so quick to return to, and to perpetuate over successive low floor orders, an awful seating arrangement that they had previously abandoned just to expedite the politically-mandated need for accessible buses. Increased accessibility is a good thing, but transit doesn’t have to become a cattle car to accommodate it. When it does, it makes it far more difficult to convince the segment of Torontonians that do not regard the TTC as a necessity in their daily lives that the system is indeed “the better way.”

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  6. Somehow the name “Praxis” doesn’t really sit well with me. Movie (and Star Trek) buffs will know that in Star Trek VI, the planet Praxis EXPLODES, causing enormous problems to the Klingons and thereby spurring the events in the film.

    Makes me wonder if this is a “warning” of sorts.

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  7. Speaking of usability – check out CBC’s pictures of the Canada Line cars. How does a city planning for the Olympics and the security paranoia that goes with it get away with having not just empty voids under seats but cantilevered seats? Howard Moscoe must be having high blood pressure at the very thought of it. The rest of us should be having high blood pressure because of the needless ranting he carried on with and which will almost certainly mean the Toronto Rockets will have no underseat storage at all.

    Steve: There are some things done in the name of “security” that have more to do with the vendor’s convenience (i.e. not changing a design). I will refrain from expressing any greater contempt for those who tried to foist the “cattle car” design on Toronto and have actually succeeded in part.

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  8. >>>>Mark Dowling…

    The preliminary Toronto Rocket design preoccupation with security (and cleaning efficiency) was TTC Staff driven, not Commissioner driven. It was part and parcel of a recommendation to add 99 or so Special Constable, to allegedly comply with the TTC’s legislated responsibilities to ensure public safety. Some perceived it as empire building at the expense of service: quantity and quality.

    It’s wrong to impugn then TTC Chair Howard Moscoe’s reaction to the CBC video as during Commission presentations on the preliminary subway designs he at times literally raged at TTC Staff for their obstinancy (perimeter seating, centre poles, no under seat access for feet or bags). Joe Mihevc also made the same points… strongly supported by the other Commissioners, including Vice Chair, now Chair Adam Giambrone.

    I know as I was there (along with Steve) and provided the Commissioners with relevant security research information that gave them the confidence to overrule TTC Staff’s overreaching security design recommendations and go forward with the much more rider-friendly final design of the Toronto Rocket cars.

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  9. In response to Stephen Cheung’s comments about the name “Praxis”, please don’t judge the event by its name. Praxis I and Praxis II are courses taken by first year engineering science students at the University of Toronto, comprising some of the brightest minds in academia. No one should expect their ideas to be perfect as they are just first year engineering students, but they can certainly bring very creative and innovative ideas into light; ideas that can revolutionize and improve the way in which we live our lives. It will certainly be interesting to see what and how these students have proposed to improve the TTC system; a system that affects millions of people in the GTA every day.

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  10. Are there pictures anywhere of the final design of the Toronto Rockets? I can’t recall what the final decision on the seats was.

    Steve: Please see the TTC website with illustrations of the new trains’ layout.

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  11. Stephen Cheung – as a big Trekkie, I have to laugh at that.
    Keni – as long as you can assure things won’t go like Praxis moon.

    I will be there.

    What’s the chance of the TTC taking on some of the things they see there?
    What’s the chance of these students going to work for the TTC at some level as engineers?

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  12. A couple of things:

    Re: Moaz Yusuf Ahmad: I don’t know if this part will get published and I understand if Steve wants to edit this part out, but how is your monorail working out for you? I know some are critical, but I think it is a brilliant technology that addresses many of the concerns of elevated rapid transit. I also have read that the current line was designed to handle capacities of 300,000 per day, do you have any plans to get longer trains running in the near future to maximize capacity?

    Back on topic, I saw a render of a proposal for the Orion VII and it is TERRIBLE (http://www.eyeweekly.com/blog/post/57934–visions-of-a-new-ttc). One of the worst things about the SRT is the fact that there are no forward facing seats, and I don’t want this to become a staple of our bus fleet.

    I think the simplest solution may be the best. Many transit systems use buses with similar low floor to high floor designs, and few have the comfort issues that plague the TTC’s fleet. Why not simply examine how these systems design their bus interiors. The Orion VII NG buses are a vast improvement over the previous ones, however I would change the middle front-right seating from 3 side facing seats to 1-2 rows of forward facing seats in sets of two. This would be a similar design to the YRT D40LF buses, minus a couple of seats for extra standing room, and believe me I’ve seen them squeeze a hell of a lot of people on them (happens when you only run a bus every 30 or so minutes…)

    Steve: If we hear back about the monorail, I will start a separate thread for it.

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