The Gare3D Mons2015 app enables users to “see” the completed new station-link, modelled in 3D in its actual setting in real time. An experience made possible by augmented reality. What does not yet exist and what only partially exists can thus be brought to life.
This is an innovative experience, particularly given the size of the model and the specific configuration of viewpoints, that pushes the furthest boundaries of what can be achieved through augmented reality. It is also completely unprecedented – the first of its kind to date. And it is right in line with the central theme of Mons 2015: “When technology meets culture”.
The Gare3D Mons2015 application can be used, from 3 specific viewpoints (la place Léopold, the temporary link and the new Convention Centre, the MICX) to make the outline of the station-link appear in the urban fabric, to materialize and assess the link and to make visible today what will only exist in the world of tomorrow.
The 3 viewpoints are shown on a map. Two of them are accessible 24 hours a day. The third – the MICX – can be accessed between 10 am and 5 pm, Monday to Friday.
These viewpoints can be brought up using two elements:
A marker with a QR code for downloading the app. This marker should be positioned on the screen of the user’s smartphone or tablet in order to access the panorama.
The user then stands on a marker on the ground indicating the “ideal” position, before aiming their smartphone at the panel in order to make the station appear. Only once the model of the station is stable on the screen will it be possible to take a photo. If they wish, users can then insert a photo of a friend or a selfie into the image. They simply need to choose from the range of options available for embedding images.
There is also a gauge available for making the station more or less transparent in order to make it more or less prominent.
The quality of the experience is obviously subject to factors over which the creator has no control, such as the quality of the equipment used and varying weather conditions. The experience might not work as well, therefore, in certain conditions and with certain equipment. The app is designed to be both fun and informative.
See and photograph
It is possible to take a photo of the station, for users to put themselves or friends into the image, and to publish and share “memories from the future” on social networks and on the site’s wall.
Touch to find out more
Further information on the main features of the Mons station project can be found on a series of pages with illustrated plans. These pages help explain the full scale of the project and its impact on the city’s transformation.
A few words on the station-link
By housing trains and buses in one single piece of infrastructure, and including car parks and connecting areas previously separated by the railway, the Mons station-link will act as a genuine hub for communication, combining functionality, connectivity, intermodality and accessibility. It is therefore one of the defining pieces in the region’s planning and indisputably one of the main projects underpinning the city’s metamorphosis.