Ecosystem of a City Car Traffic –
A systematic approach to look at a bigger problem. Modern City life is filled with chaotic surprises in its day to day experiences. From the rush to office in the morning to race back to home in the evening. A major part of our daily life is spent in travel, we travel by many kinds of means for different occassions and purposes. The one that we encounter the most, everyday in our lives is travel by car. Car, an icon of status, to luxury, to sport to everyday used utilitarian product.
The role of a car is assosciated with freedom, adventure, utility, protection and comfort. With an average of a 589 cars per 1000 people and a vehicle per capita ranking of 20 worldwide, Germany has a rich car ownership today. On the contrary, with an average of 22 cars per 1000 people, India ranks 157 worldwide in vehicles per capita rankings. Traffic Congestions today in developed nations costs citizens about $1000 every year, that they lose while sitting in traffic. As per a study done by INRIX that identified and ranked over 45,000 traffic hotspots across 123 cities in 19 European countries based upon the impact of over 200,000 traffic jams in September 2016, Across the 19 countries, the total economic impact of the traffic hotspots identified in the study is £183.2 billion over the next decade.
Future Mobility has numerous forecasts and scenarios that have been projected uptill today. But, there remains an enigma about the impact of these scenarios and projections on our lives. Without incorporating Systems Thinking to a larger extent in the way we design our future, we would probably fail to deliver an inclusive scenario that promises opportunities for our future generations. With the astronomical technological advancement that we are experiencing today, no product remains viable for much longer, unless we keep it ahead of time with constantly investing our efforts in research and design. Parking won‘t remain untouched with these advancements too, with the rise of autonomous vehicles and mixed mobility, we would need parking not just on arriving to our destinations but also for charging our cars.
Finding Parking in Social Spaces in Smart Cities. It would be nice to have a charging spot in every Parking Spot, so when we are busy in the house or office, the car can charge itself while sitting in the Parking Spot. Or in cases of emergency when we need to leave our electric car in a charging spot and take an Uber back home and get the car next day. With advancement in satellite navigational technologies, our navigational algorithms can get more different kinds of data to predict newer projections that will help with enhancing the precision values of GPS navigation systems. Gamification with and in car might find a mainstream game development community. Application of Augmented Reality can make gaming experiences more immersive.
Further information on Groovr: Project Groovr
A thesis project by: Himanshu Singh “MAID – Master of Arts of Integrated Design” Hochschule Anhalt, Dessau, Summer 2019. The MAID-blog