Judging the Subjective Impression in Subway Station

摘要

The network of subway is considered as the most important public transportation system in Tokyo downtown area. Because of the density of the subway network itself and underground constructions, newer subway lines of Tokyo have to be built at deeper depth. When the newest line started operating, there arouse much dissatisfaction from the passengers. They complains the depth of the stations. So it is required to study how people judge the subjective impression of underground space and how and by what their subjective impression is influenced. Thus a field experimental survey was conducted in underground subway stations of the newest line in Tokyo. 20 participants walked along 11 paths of subway stations from the entrance to the platform, stopping at several judging points along the routes where they answered the questionnaire sheets. As a result, participants' uneasiness has little correlation with the actual depth. Although the subjective uneasiness cannot be explained sufficiently by physical features of the environment, it can be explained in some degree by participants' subjective depth, narrowness and darkness. Direct relation between subjective depth and the actual depth are also indicated by logistic analysis, with which we can predict the ratio of people feeling certain depth to be deep or shallow. These results might contribute to the renovation of subway station in order to ease passengers' discomfort.