Public Telephone Boxes
Anthropo: Citizens. Low-income communities / Context: City. Outdoor and Indoor public spaces / Location: Venezuela
CANTV is the Venezuelan National Company of Telecommunication.
Years ago they launched a commission for the design of a new public telephone boxes to be used at out and indoor spaces around the country.
Finding: In 2009, more than 30% of Venezuelans did not have telephones at home despite the fact that the mobile phones were in every pocket. In addition, the telecommunications infrastructure did not reach all places and was very poorly maintained. In some towns, mainly in the interior areas of the country, there were simply no telephone facilities.
Challenge: The challenge was to provide the resources and create the physical conditions to give access to telephone and communication to all people anywhere in the country, within rural and urban communities.
Solution: The solution was to concentrate the telephone booths in an autonomous unit with the capacity to attend people offering different services and products such as national and international calls, internet signal, magazines, snacks, prepaid telephone cards, etc.
These public telephone booths, called CDC (CANTV Communication Centers), had to be designed based on a modular system in order to be scaled and adjusted depending on places and users. In addition, they had to be resistant to the natural elements and to vandalism. And finally, they had to include all the facilities to make it comfortable for users: light, air conditioning, acoustic and thermal insulation.
Process: We started designing using the Giorgetto Giugiaro`s method: Designing from inside to outside. It means, from the person in the seat and how he/she would interact with the box in a minimum space, from in to out, passing from the cabin itself, the other people, the noise and then until the complete CDC locate in the middle of nowhere or in a crowded street.
After more than 12 different proposals of cabins, the client chooses the model CAB09 (the first one). A model with more visibility, natural light and easier to build.
From this module and its proportions was designed a modular arrangement and structure foreseeing the different situations where the CDC would be bigger or smaller and/or if it includes a newsstand or not.
Two types of CDC were designed. The open CDC09 for indoor spaces, which included eight boxes and a reception kiosk, with a total area of 3 x 5 meters long (above). And the CDC09B, for outdoor spaces, totally autonomous, with 3 x 6 meters long, which included a space for vending machines and the air conditioning and cleaning unit (below).
One functional CDC was built and tested (see images below).
Materials and manufacture processes: All the system was designed with materials and the manufacture technologies available in the region and considering the future interaction between users (vandalism, client rotation, children, etc) and the environment and climatology). Metal: aluminium, iron and inox steel were used among the different parts. Using plasma cutting, proformer sheet metal and laser cutting machines.
The 3D model was done in Rhinoceros Software. Rendering: Flamingo
NOTE: In the final step, CDC09 was used as a political instrument. Being modified with political colors and slogans by the central government. Designthropo is not aligned with any political party or government ideology.