bus stop

 Six new bus shelters line Manchester Road, part of the newly landscaped gateway into the city of Bradford. Created by cultural development agency the Culture Company and featuring work by international artists, their 12 metre high wind turbines and architectural features are a concious effort to introduce “highly distinctve features and add something exciting to an undistinguished part of the city”. Featuring up to date technical features such as heated seating powered by the turbines, noise absorbing panels graffiti resistant materials and angled side panels to provide optimum views of oncoming buses, the intention has been to bring a high level of design to “the smallest of democratic spaces”.

  In addition the shelters incorporate artwork that aim to make the experience of waiting for a bus “more interesting and engaging by commisioning art with an element of fun, suprise and anticipation which show how new technology can be used in a creative way.”

  The work of Greyworld uses hidden colour recognition cameras to create harmonic sounds triggered by the colour of the clothing of those who pass through. Their work tries to “capture the variety and glorious difference in people, this is our material.” The sounds include a female voice who sings the colours worn by those who pass through.

  Tim Etchells, director of Forced Entertainment created a 24 hour display which changes every minute to show the time and a line of text that will “inspire travellers to imagine the stories unfolding in the city as day moves into night, charting the waking and dreamtime of a city and its inhabitants from dawn to dusk, so that travellers at 5am experience a different atmosphere from those of midday and midnight.”

  So it was in the interests of research that we sent our friend Gaz, unfortunately banned from driving by the constabulary, to roadtest the new shelters in a bid to acclimatize him to public transport. The results can be seen in the review section.