Applying Work Domain Analysis for Ecological Interface Design of Safety Monitoring System in the Urban Railway Station

This paper presents an application of the Ecological Interface Design (EID) theoretical framework for developing an optimal display of railway safety monitoring system (SMS) in stations. Especially, Work Domain Analysis (WDA) which is the preceding research for EID was conducted. This study proceeds as follows: First, urban railway SMS in stations was defined as a system boundary for WDA, and work environment for station personnels was analysed through Abstraction Hierarchy (AH). AH represents five levels (Functional Purpose, Values and Priority Measures, Purpose-related Functions, Object-related Process, Physical Object) of informations that station personnels obtain from work environment, and Work Domain Model (WDM) was derived as a result of the AH. To confirm how well WDM represents the real work environment of SMS, Scenario Mapping was conducted with experts who has been working as a station personnel for more than ten years. Lastly, thirteen additional information requirements that are not provided by the existing SMS as well as all the information that are provided by the existing SMS were extracted using confirmed WDM. These information requirements can be used as essential information for EID of urban railway SMS.