Campus Wayfinding: Tallinn University of Technology (TalTech)
TalTech, the only technological university in Estonia, is the flagship of Estonian engineering and technology education. So the fact that they chose 3D Wayfinder to create a campus wayfinding solution is an honour. The building directory includes over a thousand distinct rooms and covers more than 133 000 sqm! Campus wayfinding for universities of this size can be extremely beneficial, as there are many exchange students, visiting lecturers or people attending conferences.
TalTech’s Unique Campus Wayfinding Solution
TalTech decided to develop a 3D model of the campus and to install kiosks in conjunction with an online map. The solution lists all lecture halls, offices, dining rooms, services and other public rooms. We integrated the in-house personnel system with solution, so that it’s possible to search for a room or a lecturer. Our partner installed a kiosk at the main entrance of the university, where people are most likely to enter for the first time. The web-based map fits perfectly with the tech-savvy students, as most of them carry laptops with them to lectures anyway. Before the lecture ends you can quickly check where the next will take place and off you are! The campus wayfinding solutions work in both Estonian and English.
One particular complication we encountered was the nature of the campus, which has been built in many stages throughout the decades. The older structures lacked digital blueprints and have been remodeled numerous times. To solve this problem we visited all of the rooms in all of the corpus’. This resulted in a thorough overview of the campus, which the university lacked before.
Another good option would’ve been a mobile application, as almost everyone has one with them at all times. Indoor positioning for mobile devices work through low energy Bluetooth beacons. These beacons use triangulation to establish the user’s location and the app generates a visual graphic route to the desired destination.