seating, seat ‘accessories’ such as folding tablets, power sockets,
and ancillary items that effect the passenger seating area and
legroom such as tables, possible future train seat design scenarios
which, together with Arup’s and FIRA’s background knowledge and
experience, were used in the subsequent stages.
The project team worked on the four key factors that influence
seat comfort. Firstly, the journey type, as passengers expect
different comfort levels on different types of journey. For
example, people may tolerate a lower level of comfort on a short
journey compared with a long one.
Secondly, the dimensions and weight of people with the
objective of determining minimum dimensions suitable for the
majority of the population from large to small.
Thirdly the seat pad, as most of the complaints about seat
hardness come about when people first sit in the seat and find
the seat pad to be unyielding. The pad thickness, hardness
and durability are important factors. Indeed, if a seat pad looks
reasonably thick but feels hard the impression of discomfort
might be increased. For a comfortable seat the pad must
provide enough compression for lighter people and enough
support to prevent the pad “bottoming out” (sorry!) for heavier
people.
Finally, seat accessories such as armrests and tables are valued
by customers and were included in the process.Results
As people and their journeys vary so much the report
recommends a number of seat factors be evaluated for each
category of journey defined.Journey types
Four types of journey were identified - metro, regional, inter-
city and first class/very high speed. For each journey type, a
comfort rating scale was proposed, made up of four attributes;
seat dimensions, seat pad requirements, seat attractiveness
and seat accessories. Each of these attributes is described in
turn.Seat dimensions
The report proposes minimum seat comfort dimensions to
ensure that a seat’s features such as seat depth and legroom will
fit the majority of the UK population. People’s sizes were defined
from “BS EN ISO 7250-2:2013 Basic human body measurements
for technological design, part 2: Statistical summaries of body
measurements from national populations” and a test method was
designed using a weighted chair measurement device, to be used
in accordance with “ISO TR 24496:2017 - Office furniture - Office
work chairs - Methods for the determination of dimensions”.
A number of dimensions were specified; either pass/fail or
varied by type of journey. These included seat height, depth and
width, backrest width and armrest height, the position of the
headrest, legroom and the angle of the seat itself. Figure 1 shows
the dimensions and scores for the four journey types.24 FE ATURE