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Project Overview

This concept shelter is a test bed for ideas of how bus stops can be reimagined as meaningful social nodes. It is part of a larger initiative that encourages creative ways to re-imagine daily sights, sound, and situations around us; things and events that we may have taken for granted, and developed a blindspot towards. Through redesigning these objects and happenings or the way we interact with them, we hope it will contribute in refreshing ways people meet and share.

Project Bus Stop @ Jurong East Central is chosen as a test bed site for the first concept bus stop. Nested within a highly residential neighbourhood, the bus stop seeks to create the various social environments to make waiting for a bus a joyful experience worth waiting for.

Project Commissioner

Land Transport Authority (LTA)/Urban Redevelopment Authority (URA)

Project Creator

DP Architects Pte Ltd

Team

SEAH Chee Huang (Director)
LIM Yin Chao
Aileen KOH
Brenda LIM
Adam YAPP Jia Hua
LEE Xin Li

Project Brief

Designed as a landscape of non-conclusive kit of parts, the typically ‘placeless’ and generic-looking bus stop brims with latent social situations and environmental possibilities. Integrating slices of distinctive environments such as a garden, library, gallery, bike park, playground, energy farm – the bus stop also incorporates the latest info-communication technology, like media boards, wifi, phone charging, interactive way-finding and more. The array of social and environmental plug-ins to the bus stop provides the community with a wide palette of possibilities and opportunities for appropriation, to purposefully reshape the bus stop in their own neighbourhoods, to respond to each of their surrounding context, unique settings and evolving needs.

Project Innovation/Need

Project Bus Stop is conceived as an adaptable kit-of-parts, which enable the commuter experience to be elevated with added dimensions of productivity and fun, and creating opportunities for social and community engagement. Integrating slices of distinctive environments such as a garden within the bus shelter, green roofs, community book sharing library, community art gallery, priority waiting zone, bike park and play swing.

The prototype bus stop also incorporates latest info-communication technology, offering services like interactive smart boards, ‘green-fi’ (solar-powered Wi-Fi), phone charging, smart camera and way-finding services, powered partially by the photo-voltaic roof panels, enabling commuters to stay connected.

The rear of the bus stop is also a community art gallery, providing a canvas for distinctive artwork produced by the local community that presents the story of Jurong and its people through the lens of the community.

These social, technological and environmental plug-ins allow the community to have a wide palette of opportunities for future appropriation, to re-shape the bus stop within their own neighbourhoods.

The palette of parts can be mixed and matched to create bus stops responsive and bespoke to the surrounding context, unique settings and their own evolving needs. Ultimately, this experimental bus stop seeks to transform the experience of waiting for buses into an enjoyable, fun and enriching experience. Such features reinforce the ethos of instilling community ownership and participation, enhancing the public pride of place.

Design Challenge

Project Bus Stop began as a corporate social responsibility and ground-up imitative proposed by the architect, that test-beds innovative ideas on how infrastructural amenities such as bus stops can be re-imagined as meaningful social nodes.

This urban experiment was realised with the support of key Singapore government agencies such as Urban Redevelopment Authority (URA), Land Transport Authority (LTA), Info-communications Media Development Authority (IMDA) and National Parks Board (NParks). This multi-stakeholder venture showcases how authorities, architects and the community can capitalise on the untapped potential of our urban infrastructural and transport system in shaping Singaporeans’ daily lives.

With a daily ridership of 3.9 million commuters, and more than 4800 bus stops throughout Singapore, our urban infrastructural and transport system has the tremendous untapped potential to be mobile, extensive and inclusive. Through this prototype, we explored ways we can socialise and transform our transport system, beyond vehicles or machineries, into part of our experiential journey and story through our city. The collaborative process of co-creation resulted in a truly purposeful and inclusive design of everyday architecture that engages, enriches and empowers the community.

Sustainability

Project Bus Stop is conceived as a modular kit of parts based on the standard 3m wide structural modules used in existing bus stops island wide. The modular parts can be upgraded or swopped for other units – giving rise to a high degree of flexibility and adaptability that greatly enhances the lifespan of the bus stop. This modular approach to construction confers benefits in terms of economies of scale and buildability.

One of the adaptable parts of the bus stop relates to the having modular greenery kit-of-parts that can be added to allow the bus stop to enhance the greenery of the immediate surroundings. These modules, such as vertical green walls, green roofs, and planters for trees, show how our transport infrastructures can become green lungs for our city.

In line with the narrative of a smart bus stop, the project also uses renewable energy in the form of solar panels on the roof to power the wifi equipment within the bus stop, allowing us to power these social and technological elements without adding to the carbon footprint.

Urban Design

This award celebrates creativity and innovation in the process of designing and shaping cities, towns and villages, and is about making connections between people and places, movement and urban form, nature and the built fabric. Consideration given to giving form, shape and character to groups of buildings, streets and public spaces, transport systems, services and amenities, whole neighbourhoods and districts, and entire cities, to make urban areas functional, attractive and sustainable.
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