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cyberferret

Some of these may be really arty, but IMO a functional bus shelter need to have:

* Protection from weather (both sun and rain)

* Protection from wind

* Some sort of privacy or seclusion area for women or children who have to wait alone

* Comfortable seating for long waits

* Space to put your bags or shopping without having to have them on the ground.

* Provide a clear view of approaching buses

Amazing how many architectural 'designs' miss some of these simple elements.

The only thing the simple concrete bus shelters in MY small Australian town have to distinguish them is paintings by local school children and artists [0], but at least they meet most of the above criteria.

[0] - https://www.abc.net.au/news/2016-06-08/darwin-bus-stops-pain...

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> Some sort of privacy or seclusion area for women or children who have to wait alone

I’m neither of those things, but if the issue is personal safety, wouldn’t a secluded and private area be worse?

I'm similarly baffled by these ideas. They seem like bad ideas for so many reasons.

1. The point you make.

2. Any man or masculine-looking woman who winds up there (either accidentally or as the result of the other areas filling up) will be automatically viewed as a threat.

3. They're the western equivalent of burkas in that they promote the idea that men are uncontrollable beings and that the onus is on women to insulate themselves from us. (Though obviously they're far less extreme than a burka.)

4. A woman who can't be there finds herself alone in a sea of men, which seems like an extreme version of the situation they're trying to avoid.

This was my thought as well. Put someone who is vulnerable into an area where passers by can't see them, and then what?

Hope the stalker doesn't follow them in? Hope the opportunist criminals won't go stop to stop looking for someone alone to rob? etc etc

Privacy and seclusion are absolutely not whats needed at a public bus stop.

Let me clarify - I as talking about an area that allows a person to sit alone without the chance of anyone else sitting right next to them. I’ve seen benches with a separate seat with a high armrest or space between it to let a person sit alone.

Also, some of the bus shelters in my town have seats at the rear, which les someone sit and wait without wing visible from the street. Some have a small side wall which serve to obstruct the seated person from being fully viewed from approaching cars (if they wished).

> Amazing how many architectural 'designs' miss some of these simple elements.

I'd argue that most of your points are usually not missed but left out deliberately. Protection against vandalism is the most important design criterion because damage from vandalism is the biggest cost factor. All the other things are often optional from the sponsors point of view.

Providing privacy and comfortable space are often explicitly not desired. There is even an name for that kind of design: Hostile architecture [1]

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hostile_architecture

In Canberra the older Action bus shelters were concrete tubes They were pretty barren but in the cold wind of winter it was great. Looking at the photo's in the article I kept thinking, it snows there, won't they be so cold and freezing.

Men who have to wait alone can also be harassed or the target of criminals. I wouldn't exclude anyone from needing protection against crimes.

>Some sort of privacy or seclusion area for women or children who have to wait alone

How is this supposed to work? Especially with bus stations of that size?

The functionality of the bus shelters in the article appears to be to educate people about the wrong priorities and unappealing aesthetics of modern architecture. They're doing quite well in that regard.

Combining useful functionality and appealing aesthetics is a lost art nowadays. Even Apple has become mediocre at it. But modern architecture seems to strive for the exact opposite.

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