Designing a sustainable working environment for traffic operators
Can an operator monitor 14 separate screens, to keep traffic safe — and remain sane at the same time?
The Red Line is one of Stockholm’s busiest subway routes: every day tens of thousands of journeys criss-cross the Swedish capital as people hurry to work, day-care centres, schools, shops, hospitals, and home again.
The nerve-centre of the subway system, the Control Room, is no less busy. And it’s just as crowded: not with people — a team of five supervises the traffic-flow — but with digital equipment. At each desk an operator has to monitor eight screens and seven IT-systems … using seven keyboards and seven mouses!
And this Control Room was destined to become even more crowded. On the horizon was an upgrade that added further digital systems: another five to seven screens would have to be crammed in!
SL, Stockholm’s public transport company, acknowledged that such additions would be a bridge too far. They would dramatically worsen the working environment; and splitting the operators’ attention among the additional screens would surely raise serious safety concerns.
Yet the upgrades were inevitable. And that’s when SL reached out to us at inUse Experience. The challenge: to create a substantial improvement in the operators’ day-to-day working environment.
As a User Experience designer, I’ve been responsible for the entire project, from the tiniest detail to the overall picture. And it’s all been done for the benefit of the five operators, when they’re chasing vital seconds.
A subway Control Room is an extremely complex environment. My first action was to observe, follow and interview users during a typical working day. I spent a lot of time in the Control Room, looking over people’s shoulders.
At the start of my work I also did a good deal of research outside SL. A study visit to Copenhagen Police — the Danes are at the cutting edge in Control Rooms — yielded fresh insights and new knowledge about working in a stressful environment. After that visit I did my very first sketch, which proposed a dynamic setup, that had system windows flowing across several screens.
After I’d been at SL a while, many of their team expressed curiosity about the way my ideas were going. So I gave a couple of internal presentations of my work. I talked about its purpose and goal; but I also highlighted the significance of the mission, in terms of the substantial impact the Control Room’s performance has on everyday life for the average Stockholm commuter. I brought this point home with a quick estimate: if just one single second is lost, because of some subway malfunction, it could well affect over ten thousand passengers. Add those seconds up, and you’re looking at a considerable tally of hours. Think of the huge effect one operator’s work can have on people travelling in the Swedish capital. Will Anders be on time to pick his daughter up from kindergarten? Will Lisa catch her flight out of Arlanda airport? Will Sofia get home in time for her husband’s birthday surprise? So many thousand people are dependent on the Red Line’s trains running to schedule.
At this stage in the process I learned how valuable it can be — especially in a complex project — to visualise your goal. When you’re homing in on nitty-gritty details, it’s all too easy to forget the bigger picture, and what the higher purpose of the work really is. As a designer one is constantly shifting focus, between the holistic perspective and the tiniest elements. Joining the dots, between the wood and the trees, is a significant aspect of the job.
The longer I spent in the Red Line Control Room, the more I appreciated the importance of communication. Spoken conversations between colleagues was a non-stop flow. In this outstanding team, even vocal intonation carried information; even talking across each other became a productive and important part of their work.
For me, hearing a train-driver reporting a fault became a true ‘light-bulb’ moment. As he rang in about a defunct signal he’d noticed, everyone in the room listened to the phone wedged between the Control manager’s ear and shoulder, taking action, offering help. Solutions were openly discussed, and everyone contributed proposals for resolving the problem. Within a few seconds the manager made a decision, gave the order, and the frantic implementation began. In such an intricate daily environment, every second is crucial.
On that occasion, I realised that the layout of the Control Room was every bit as important as that of the digital workspace. For the staff there to function as a great team we had to design a physical workplace that endorsed their modus operandi. This was a classic instance of gaining knowledge and experience in the field, insight that would never have come my way if I’d stayed in the office. To study users in their own environment is of paramount importance.
Sometimes, however, I did actually stay in the office. I built my first Control Room prototype at my own desk, stacking a couple of screens one above the other, to see if it would be both physically and ergonomically viable. Could I see my co-workers? Could they hear orders I might need to give? I knew I had to shape a dynamic environment that would allow the team to communicate fast and efficiently, while chasing seconds to solve problems and help commuters.
I soon realised I needed to think beyond the user’s experience at his or her own desk. The Control Room environment is a demanding one, and only a holistic approach would create a sustainable working place. I consulted sound-specialists to learn how best to shape the acoustics of the space. An interior designer was hired to help with colour and fabrics. Having also taken great care over factors like lighting and background noise, I finally came up with a proposal that I truly and genuinely believed in.
It was tough not being able to test usability as we went. We couldn’t set up worthwhile early trials, since the integrated project had so many diverse spatial aspects. Further down the road, though, our piecemeal sketches and prototypes came together in a first physical mock-up. Building the full-sized model gave us a real-life opportunity to test the solution, and it was truly exciting .
With this mock-up ready, we invited everyone to an open house to try it out. A large sheet of paper on the wall invited participants’ thoughts and comments. I was extremely curious to learn the reactions of all the people at SL.
Because we work in an iterative way at inUse, every project is a journey, in which the solution can be improved and refined over time. We approach problems and challenges collectively — involving experts and users — to create better prototypes, which ultimately yield better solutions. The traffic Control Room environment is complex, offering plenty of challenges: I love the feeling when you crack a tough problem, and take a step closer to a truly great solution.
This complex working environment was the most exciting part of the SL project. So many parameters came into play: the technology, the screens, the desks, and also sound and light. I love getting a major project that might strike some as a bit nebulous. I have to figure out what’s important, and map out areas where we can hope to make the biggest difference.
To work through the process — constantly improving, working iteratively, then getting to assess the results — that’s when all your hard work pays off. I’m making a big difference in these people’s lives by creating usefulness … and for a designer that’s the best feeling in the world.
