Infrastructure

Alone in Hong Kong - a tourist perspective from Apogee

DanielSzuc — Sat, 23 Aug 2008 15:25:34 -0400

You are alone in a new city called "Hong Kong".

What does it feel like to be a tourist in Hong Kong?
Do the signs tell you where you need to go?
Does the transportation help to get you where you need to go?
What do you need to use the transportation effectively?
Do people in the city help?

Apogee - www.apogeehk.com decided to be tourists for a day in our home city of Hong Kong. This journey talks to an experience tourists may have with the transport in order to get where they need to go. Does transport improve the tourist experience? Or did it get in the way of having a good time? Try this in your own city and let us know how you went :)

Social gap widens from outer to inner Melbourne

DanielSzuc — Sun, 10 Aug 2008 13:35:57 -0400

Social gap widens from outer to inner MelbourneSUBURBIA is bearing the brunt of rising fuel prices and extreme mortgage stress, a major study of Australian cities has found. Governments must step in to provide outer suburbs with better public transport or risk extreme social breakdown, it warned.

What if there were no bridges between Boston and Cambridge?

World Usability Day — Sun, 03 Aug 2008 14:19:53 -0400

With two of the bridges that are the main spans across the Charles River in Boston in need of major repairs, what would happen if they were both unusable? Read on!

The Airport User Experience - travel delays in Shanghai

DanielSzuc — Thu, 31 Jul 2008 15:45:38 -0400

As part of a User Research project in China this month we are running in depth interviews in both Shanghai and Dalian. We arrived at Shanghai airport yesterday (7 July 2008) taking the super fast Maglev from the city expecting to take an afternoon flight to Dalian. Well ... that was yesterday and this is today and we are still waiting (fog over Dalian apparently making it hard to land the plane). The plus side is its forced us into a situation to sit at the airport for a longer time than usual and provides a nice opportunity to better watch airport operations when a flight is delayed.http://www.apogeehk.com/articles/TheAirportUserExperience-TravelDelaysInShanghai.html

President Bush Calls For New Highway Tolls and Major Overhaul of Transportation Policy

World Usability Day — Wed, 30 Jul 2008 12:17:54 -0400

The Bush administration unveiled a plan to impose new tolls on freeways and encourage more private investment to finance road and mass-transit projects, a move aimed at stirring debate as lawmakers prepare for a major overhaul of transportation policy. For more.

Funds for Highways Plummet as Drivers Cut Gasoline Use

World Usability Day — Wed, 30 Jul 2008 12:12:18 -0400

An uprecedented cutback in driving, is cutting the funds available for building the nation's aging highway system and expanding the mass-transit options. In a report to be released on Monday, July 28th by the U.S. Department of Transportation, it shows that over the past seven months, Americans have reduced their driving by more than 40 billion miles. Click here to read more.