Developing urban equipment, an inclusive design proposal

Abstract

This project is based on the study of urban furniture thinking at inclusive design, for that reason the users difficulties have to be acknowledged. On market study, actual urban furniture present at Oporto will be analyzed to know the different characteristics, materials and dimensions of the product. The initial project development aim was to find the characteristics that the inclusive bench should have. For that, the study of ergonomics, anthropometrics and functionality will concur to define some important bench measures. The user analysis is done through co-design methodology. It is a study of the product interaction problems by mean of users help. In this way, theirs possibilities and difficulties can be identified and used to define the user needs. On the analysis, also the stakeholders needs will be taken into account, like decisive agents and product workers. All needs will be conducted leading to product specifications. The experimental part, is done with prototypes developed by EDDP students at FEUP with Norchapa company collaboration. The developed projects will be analyzed using the features for the inclusive bench. Finally, the developed product properties evaluation will be done. The conclusion presents suitable design projects and some possible improvements to better fulfil an inclusive design.