Designing public transportation : how a future Scania city bus concept could look and function

Abstract: Modern cities are growing, and with them comes increases in green-house gas emissions, congestion and demands for transportation. Urban traffic in 2025 and forward is set to change drastically, with demands for only zero emission vehicle operation in city centres across the world. To meet the demands of these cities, shorter alternatives to today's public transportation could become of interest. This report is a Master of Science Thesis in Industrial Design Engineering done at Luleå University of Technology in collaboration with Scania CV AB in Södertälje, Sweden. The objective of this project was to give Scania an overview of their technical potential to build a short bus using existing components as well as deliver a concept of how one such product might look and function. The aim of this project is to develop a bus concept for Scania based on stakeholder demands and the components Scania has at their disposal. The research questions posed and answered in this report is the following; What demands are there on future urban buses? What components does Scania need to develop or purchase to build a shorter bus? How would the aesthetics, functions and layout of a bus aimed to meet the demands of urban centres and commuters be designed? The development followed a modified design thinking process, narrowing the project into three phases called Learn, Ideate and Prototype. These phases focused on one type of development, information gathering and understanding for Learn, idea generation and creation for Ideate and realisation and detail development for Prototype. Each phase consisted of research and design methods specialized for each phase and its mission. Examples of methods used during Learn is interviews and a case study, examples for Ideate is brainstorming and morphological charts and examples for Prototype is digital modelling and rendering. The final concept presented in this report is called Scania LVL and is a city bus concept planned to several years into the future. This concept consists of three parts, one visual exterior body concept, one component packing and usage concept and a seating layout, all coming together into one concept. The final concept met both the aim and goal of the project well and gave a good, but not perfect representation of what a short Scania bus could look and function like using all existing components.