Stadler EC250 Giruno
The design of a new train is an enormously complex task, subject to countless technical, economic and safety-related imperatives. With a train that is required to travel through several countries, each with their own peculiar regulations and standards, the invitation to tender can clock up a total of more than 3000 mandatory requirements. This was what it was like with the new high-speed train Giruno, commissioned by SBB after a competitive tendering procedure from Stadler Rail AG, with the industrial design agency Nose as a design partner. It is due to be commissioned in 2019, and will serve the connection between Germany and Italy through Switzerland by way of the Gotthard Base Tunnel. The design of the Giruno train was in keeping with the SBB motto of “At home on the move”, with an emphasis on comfort, elegance and customer friendliness – especially for families, senior citizens and people with mobility restrictions. The requirements of barrier-free design have been met on all levels. Thus the train, as the first of its kind, is equipped with low-floor access suitable for two platform heights, which makes it very much easier to get on and off. The circulation areas inside the train are laid out in such a way that the dining car is easily accessible with a wheelchair. Wheelchair spaces also have special folding tables provided. The seat numbering includes a version in Braille, and even the opening of the waste bins is at a conspicuously low height.
Comments of the nominators
A convincingly successful train design, one that consistently takes to heart the requirement of freedom from barriers and realises it in innovative ways. The low-floor entry is suitable for different platform heights, a unique feature in high-speed trains to date. The old mistaken view that freedom from barriers is only possible at the expense of design quality has been impressively refuted by the Giruno train.
Comments of the jury
Good design means the solution of problems – and the Giruno project can serve as a real textbook case to illustrate this venerable, but too often misunderstood design principle. The convincing impression made by the solutions propounded for this train is in part the result of an exemplary and cleverly thought out process of development. In the course of this, all the parties involved – Nose, Stadler, Swiss Federal Railways and various customer groups – subjected a 40 metre long one-to-one mockup of the train, complete with luggage, bicycles and wheel chairs, to repeated testing, and their joint efforts and input all contributed to the project’s success. It is an impressive achievement in itself to carry out a design task fraught with challenges of all kinds in such a short space of time, without losing sight of central objectives like freedom from barriers. But the way in which this has been realised in the Giruno makes the new high speed train a reference project, both in functional and aesthetic terms, for matters associated with barrier-free design.
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