Ergonomic Study of Occupant Seating Using Near-Vertical Posture for Shared Mobility Applications

Transportation system is at the brink of revolution and many new ways of mobility are arising in the market to ease the pressure on the established transportation infrastructure. Many companies and governments around the world are exploring innovative options in the space of shared mobility to reduce the overall carbon footprint. To expedite the adoption of shared mobility in India, it is necessary to make such options comfortable and cost-effective. One of the most effective way to make shared mobility options cost effective is to comfortably increase occupancy per vehicle footprint.

This paper aims to evaluate a novel method of occupant seating to identify the maximum number of passengers a vehicle can accommodate without significant impact on occupant comfort. It is assumed that shared mobility options are used for a short duration of commute, and hence the comfort of the seat can be marginally compromised to increase the total number of occupants. This paper studies the relation between occupant comfort and the seating posture. The resulting study is used to evaluate the possible increase in vehicle occupancy. Seating postures, ranging from flat seat to a near-vertical posture, are analyzed and the trade-off between number of occupants inside the vehicle and occupant comfort is studied with respect to the cushion angle. The results of the paper can be referred while designing the seating system for shared mobility.