Canopy Shows Tube Travelers What’s Going on Above Ground

Ever wondered what was going on above ground when you travel on the tube? Well the expected delays during the Olympics could be more entertaining if the trains were fitted with Canopy.

The Canopy concept has been designed by Matt Batchelor, Amrita Kulkarni and Emma Laurin on the Innovation Design Engineering course at the RCA and Imperial College London.

Canopy is a dynamic e-paper display fixed to train ceiling panels and would display the landmarks and environments above ground to passengers who are trying their hardest not to make eye-contact with their fellow travelers.

Canopy also provides day and night skies, with ‘ambient’ weather animations – this should do away with any surprise changes that our wonderful weather may otherwise have in store. We’ve all been there – it’s winter at the start of your journey and then nigh on tropical at the other end.

It would also make the ceiling prime QR code packing advertising real-estate – just imagine whizzing past/under an attraction and then being able to purchase tickets by scanning the code displayed on Canopy.

The real info needed to power Canopy would be stored on an embedded PC on the train carriage and updated at the depot or in stations and tunnels that have newly installed Wi-Fi.

Would this be cool or just freak you out when you go under The Thames?