GEOGRAPHIES OF INFRASTRUCTURE SYSTEMS: THE USER'S LIFEWORLD AND INTERFACE DESIGN

Some of the most important features of modern societies are the specialisation of knowledge, the development of technology and its ubiquitous integration in everyday practices. Apparently, the routine use of complex transport, communication and retail systems can only work out as long as a continuous encoding and decoding of spatial information takes place. In this paper different modes of system-user-interaction and the involved spatial concepts will be examined. The outcome is a framework of three conceptual types of interaction (or translation) between the geography of the system and the geography of the user's lifeworld. First, the user learns about the internal spatial code of the system to achieve white-box-transparency. Second, efforts in interface-design show the attempt for lifeworld-simulation by replicating the individual's spatial perception. Third, common geographical imaginations, names of cities, regions or nations, can serve as a third language which both the system and the user can refer to.