Nudging passenger behaviour

Abstract

To reach the ambition of becoming Europe’s Preferred Airport, Schiphol has set targets for the satisfaction rating of various aspects within the passenger journey. However, some of these aspects are scoring below target. One of these aspects that weighs heavy on the overall assessment is the (process of) baggage reclaim. Aside from the actual waiting time, the most mentioned pain point within this process step is the ‘course of events’, rereferring to issues with crowding and congestions. Research shows that waiting in a crowded environment will cause discomfort and strengthen negative emotions. Problems with crowding are in many cases related to human behaviour. Most of our behaviour follows from subconscious decisions and mental shortcuts. As such, pedestrians automatically take the shortest route, the route of least resistance, the most direct route or just follow others. These behaviours can explain multiple bottlenecks and issues with crowding within the current reclaim areas. To prevent or mitigate these issues it is required to achieve a behavioural change on the passengers’ side. Behavioural interventions can be used to steer these automatic decisions and nudge the desired behavior. This project explores if- and how behavioural interventions can mitigate or prevent problems with crowding in order to smoothen the course of events. The insights can be used to enhance the passenger experience for the development of the A-area as well as the existing infrastructure. The preliminary design of the A-terminal is compared on similarities with the current reclaim areas in order to determine the probable bottlenecks. It resulted in six objectives that - if achieved - either create a better distribution of passengers or prevent crowding around the baggage carousels. A behavioural intervention is proposed for each of these objectives. By means of a field experiment one of the interventions is tested and validated. An overwhelming majority of passengers in reclaim area 1 tend to use only one out of two exits. It leads to a messy customs process and stagnation in passenger flow. The intervention aimed to redirect passengers to the second exit by making use of floor markings and additional signage, prompting passengers to ‘skip the queue’ when it started crowding. The first results suggest that nudges are indeed capable of steering passenger movement and path choice. However, iterations should be made on the design in order to improve its effectivity. If the effect is strongh enough, it might make crowd controllers at this area unneccessary. Overall, behavioural interventions seems to be a promising area for experiments and innovation within AAS, especially when congestions and process time are mostly dependent on passenger behaviour.