NYC SMART BUS
A proposal for an automated modular bus system for NYC
NYC SMART BUS is a design project to propose an automated modular bus system for NYC by Hiroyuki Kondo, Jie Qian, and Sam Shin. The new bus has three characteristics. It is small enough to go through the narrow streets in Manhattan. It has a self-driving system and does not need drivers. The body can be easily replaced, and the vehicle can be used for other purposes, for example, food truck, shipping service. Hiroyuki was mainly in charge of gathering user comments, data analysis, and data visualization of the project. This project was selected in the Future of NYC Transportation projects organized by NYC Media Lab and HAVAS.
METHOD
Design Research / Data Visualization
TOOL
Python / Processing / Photoshop
ROLE
Design Researcher / Data Analyst
PERIOD
February 2019 - April 2019
User Research
To understand what commuters in NYC think about the public transportation system, we gathered the comments using an online form. The comments indicated that no one preferred buses to other transportation system, subways, walk, or cycles. The main reasons are longer travel time, unreliability, and the complicated bus system.
Data Analysis and Visualization
In addition to the comments from users, it is essential to understand how the current NYC Bus system works. I gathered the position data of buses running in NYC every two minutes on February 12th using the API service of the Metropolitan Transportation Authority. I analyzed the data in three different ways: the number of buses, the number of lines, and the roads which the buses go through. I analyzed the data using python and made visualizations with Processing and Microsoft Excel.
Analysis 1: How many buses run in a day?
The number of buses running in NYC is different depending on the time; more than three thousand buses work at peak time, and less than five hundred vehicles run at 3 am. This visualization shows that many vehicles are not used at night.
Analysis 2: The number of the journeys and lines in each borough of NYC
New York City consists of five boroughs: Manhattan, Brooklyn, Queens, Bronx, and Staten Island. I visualized the number of lines in and between each borough. The result shows that Queens has the largest number of bus lines, and Manhattan is the fourth largest. However, all boroughs are connected to Manhattan with bus lines. It is the center of the bus transportation system of the City.
Analysis 3: Where do buses run in Manhattan?
Manhattan south of 60th Street is one of the most crowded parts in the NYC area. I visualized the position, and the number of buses in this area from 7 am to 10 am every two minutes. About four hundred buses are running at a peak time around 9 am. Then, I compared the cumulative GPS data with the roads in this area. The result shows that the bus routes are limited, and many buses go through the wide streets: 14th, 23rd, 34th, 42nd, 49th, 50th, 57th, 59th. Many streets are too narrow for the existing forty-feet buses.
Proposal
To solve the problems of the unstable demands of the vehicles and the limited number of routes, we proposed the idea of a small self-driving bus that is replaceable. The upper half of the car is replaceable, and it can be used both for a bus and other purposes: food truck, delivery service. It carries people during day time. After peak time, the body will be replaced in a facility around NYC, and MTA rent it to other companies. The bus is small enough to go through the narrow streets.
