01333053

Component

Individual bus operators specify vehicles in line with their own unique requirements. Collectively, diversity across vehicle specifications increases costs and lead time and decreases quality in local bus manufacture, paradoxically having negative consequences for the very function that specifications were intended to improve. The vehicle specifications are driven by functional requirements and are therefore difficult to reconcile with manufacturing by simply reducing them. This research set out to develop bus designs balancing user and manufacturer needs. Investigation found that specification diversity results from bus operators determining designs to meet their requirements--resulting in a raft of solutions to the same or similar problems. Two interventions to this situation were formulated; that a higher-specification product could offer equal or better function to bus operators while being of standardised manufacture; and that a system of modular design could be implemented where specification differences were functionally justified. These approaches were tested in the design, manufacture and market implementation of a new driver's area for transit buses. Through analysis of 12 months of manufacture the new driver's area was found to meet the requirements of private and government bus operators while also streamlining manufacture. The research resulted in a definitive design strategy for the development of better public transit vehicles, and a tangible contribution to the field in the form of a new product.

01329018

11-0852

English

14p

2011

Transportation Research Board 90th Annual Meeting

DVD

Figures; Photos; References (25) ; Tables (2)

Bus drivers; Bus transit operations; Buses; Manufacturing; Public transit; Specifications; Vehicle design

Transit vehicles

Public Transportation; Vehicles and Equipment; I91: Vehicle Design and Safety

Transportation Research Board Annual Meeting 2011 Paper #11-0852

TRIS, TRB

Feb 17 2011 5:36PM