The Flying-V is a unique concept aircraft to fly more energy efficient. With the V-shape passenger cabin integrated in its wings, a new interior is created with four different seat concepts. This raises the question of how the onboard services could be designed for the Flying-V. As a matter of fact, food plays an influencing role on the overall flight experience. The main objective of this project is to develop a vision for 2050 on the future onboard services and create a concept that delivers an improved food and flight experience to the passenger.

This report contains the process and relevant outcomes of the graduationproject “Interior design of the new VDL Futura travel coach”. Generally,this report is divided into four phases: an analysis phase, an ideation &concepting phase, an iteration phase and an embodiment phase.During the analysis phase, both a passenger experience and literatureresearch were conducted. The outcomes of both researches supportedeach other on several topics. The main findings were: lighting issues,sound nuisance issues and seat-comfort related issues. Seat-comfortrelated issues were explicitly not in the scope of this project and werefor this reason neglected.By applying an experimental approach - combining elements of the ViPmethodwith the more ‘traditional’ design methods - analysis data wereconstructed using different tools. The key topics from these data were:‘differentiation as a strategy’, ‘design an experience’, ‘taking the coachto a premium level by applying the CARE-vision’ and ‘social relevance ofthe coach’.These data were later merged into one mission, addressing both thecurrent negative aspects of the interior and the future purposes. Thismission is “Design an interior that transforms travelling by coach froman obstacle to the passenger’s experiential activity into a part of thepassenger’s experiential activity”.Next, an advanced concept was defined. This concept is merely anabstract thought about what the intention and goals of the conceptshould become. Deriving this advanced concept into an intermediatedesign has helped the process getting to a final design.The final design - planned for within the next 5 years - has become a‘stepping stone’ towards an appropriate solution for the later future(2030).During the embodiment phase, a modular assembly has been definedto detail, taking experts’ advices into account and optimizations inorder to create a feasible end result. This modular assembly contains allnecessary parts, which are repeated over the length of the coach.A prototype has been made as well in order to verify the concept. Thisprototype is a simplified version of the end product. Eventually, a finaluser test will be done to evaluate and verify the goals of the end product.Unfortunately, the extended user test could not take place before thedeadline of this report.A preliminary test has been done with a few users in order to getpeople’s first thoughts and concerns. This preliminary test was overallvery positive. The results of the extended user test will be presentedduring the final presentation of this graduation project.

Designing a bus seat with an increased comfort perception for the passengers with regards to physical and cognitive aspects was the assignment for my graduation project at the TU Delft executed in collaboration with VDL Bus & Coach.

The aim of this project is to improve passengers’ experience regarding boarding and alighting by designing the rear entrance and its vicinity. Based on the findings from literature researches on product experience and comfort, a series of extensive passenger researches were performed to explore passengers’ needs and wants of different levels. Four elements, ‘ergonomic enhancement’, ‘ spacious entrance’, ‘transition for immersion’ and ‘transparent information’, were identified to be essential for improving passengers’ boarding and alighting experience. The final concept was designed accordingly, and a full-scale mockup was built and evaluated. The result shows that the new rear entrance is capable of improving passengers boarding and alighting experience significantly.

This master thesis shows the redesign of a travel coach sleeping cabin. The sleeping cabin used to be an empty box with a mattress only, but after the redesign it has become a pleasant environment to sleep in and wake up in. The sleeping cabin contains several unique selling points which will help VDL distinguish themselves from their competitors, but also which will offer the travel coach driver a unique user experience with the aid of product interaction.

The redesign has been based on an iterative process in which research, such as literature about comfort, experiences and well-being has been done. As well as field research (interviews and observations) and user tests. This research has been used in order to get insights in the possibilities within a sleeping cabin. The ideation and conceptualisation phase have been done as well, resulting in different concepts based on experience, not in shape. The final stages as embodiment design and validation have been done simultaneously, resulting in a final user test, done with a full scale mock up.

Overall, it can be concluded that the sleeping cabin has been improved significantly and that VDL can distinguish themselves from their competitors.