Design Team

Soren Luckins - Director

Every city is responsible for the safety and wellbeing of it's residents and visitors. Steadily growing mobile phone use has seen pedestrian deaths and accidents soar, prompting a studio-initiated design sprint to find a solution.

A population boom in major Australian cities has seen a startling increase in both vehicle and pedestrian traffic. Steadily growing mobile phone use has seen pedestrian deaths and accidents soar. In the last year, 165 pedestrians died on Australia's roads. Around 3,500 pedestrians are seriously injured each year.

In Australia, one in three pedestrians use a mobile phone while crossing roads. Studies find that mobile phone use reduces the user's normal field of vision by 95 percent. It compromises situational awareness, attentional processes, visual and aural perceptual processes, information processing, and decision-making. It exposes pedestrians to greater risk of an accident.

Rather than attempting to modify behavior by legislation, we want to make cities safer by design. By utilizing existing infrastructure, Smart Tactile Paving™ by Büro North brings pedestrian traffic lights down to earth. Traffic lights embedded in pavement would keep pedestrians using mobile phones safer by highlighting traffic messaging on the ground, within their diminished field of vision.

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