The purpose of this project was to develop the preliminary design of a public transportation system (PTS) that would support a theme park. Disney's America, a theme park originally planned for Northern Virginia, was used as the basis for this project. The problem was that the primary interstate that serves the park site was already overcrowded; this project was intended to expand the realm of possible transportation solutions to include public-transit solutions. The following report identifies five feasible transit mode alternatives for the PTS. It shows calculations that were performed to determine various aspects of each transit system design, including headway, operating time, cycle time, number of vehicles, total number of vehicles required, and frequency of service. This report also describes evaluation criteria that were used in the decision making process. It presents the results of a life-cycle cost analysis that was performed as part of the evaluation of alternatives. From the alternative systems that were considered, the bus transit system was selected for the PTS. / Master of Science

Report (M.S.)--Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University, 1994. / Abstract. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 173-175). Also available via the Internet.

abstract: Healthcare is one of the most personal and complex services provided, and as such, designing healthcare environments is particularly challenging. In the last couple of decades, researchers have concentrated their efforts on exploring the elements of the hospital environment that affect patients' health and in finding ways to apply that knowledge in contemporary healthcare design. But despite the growing body of research, there is an element of utmost importance to healing environments that has not been studied very extensively: the patient experience. The interaction of patients with their environment shapes their personal experience, and inversely, focusing on designing experiences rather than services can inform the design of successful healing environments. This shift from designing services to designing experiences has deep implications in healthcare settings because of the stressful situations that patients have to go through; memorable experiences have a positive influence on a patient's emotional health because they help minimize stress and in healthcare environments this translates into improved outcomes. The concept of assembling experiences is not new, especially in the entertainment industry; it was, in fact, the underlying principle behind the creation of the first theme park more than fifty years ago: Disneyland. Today, Disney is an entertainment industry leader and their design concepts and practices have been perfected to achieve the Company's main purpose: to immerse Guests in a happy, unforgettable experience. This research study focuses on examining the principles used by Disney designers, or Imagineers, as they are called within the organization, to generate memorable experiences, and how those theories can be adopted and adapted by healthcare designers to create better healing environments. However, Disney's Imagineering is not the only approach considered in this research. A thorough analysis would not be complete without delving into the concept of experiential design as a design process and from an economical perspective, as well as without analyzing recent notions about the importance of authenticity in businesses and its implications on design. This study, therefore, suggests a new healing environment design model based on a comprehensive review of the literature related to three main design approaches: Disney Imagineering, experiential design and authenticity. / Dissertation/Thesis / M.S.D. Design 2012