June 10, 2014 – CHK America President and CEO, Rick Wood announced today that the company has been hired by the Port Authority of Allegheny County to complete Phase One of a signage and wayfinding program for six of the agency’s high-volume, downtown light rail stations – and associated bus stop connection points.

CHK will begin with a site survey of the six stations and nine bus stops, analyzing and making recommendations for developing a comprehensive and fully integrated customer information wayfinding and signage system. Based on those recommendations, test signs will be fabricated and installed in order to gain valuable rider and stakeholder feedback. Ultimately, the lessons learned from this pilot program may result in a system wide implementation for Port Authority’s over 7,200 bus stops.

During the analysis, CHK will apply their well-researched, “Psychology of Wayfinding” philosophy and proprietary “8 Second Rule.” The analysis will take into account the importance of providing diagrammatic maps complete with color-coded routes and frequencies, “you are here” markers, contextual key landmark symbols, and standardized wayfinding icons. These easy-to-use decision-making tools have been found to minimize rider confusion and stress within public transportation systems, helping to increase ridership as both regular and first time riders navigate a system easily and comfortably.

“CHK America is proud to have been chosen by Port Authority to assist in this significant customer service effort,” stated CHK America CEO, Rick Wood. “The results of the Phase One program will be integral in determining how the agency proceeds with a complete system wide customer information solution.”

Port Authority currently operates approximately 700 buses, 83 light rail vehicles and 2 incline cars providing public transportation along 102 routes covering 130 municipalities within Allegheny County (including the City of Pittsburgh).

CHK, America – Established in 1999, CHK America is the premier best practice provider of customer information solutions for the US public transportation industry. The company’s 8 Second Rule, has set the standard for communicating complex public transit information to customers, after their research identified that customers allow only eight seconds in which to interpret travel information before becoming frustrated – resulting in customer dissatisfaction. Under the leadership of CEO Rick Wood, a recognized speaker of and the foremost authority in wayfinding strategies, CHK America now reaches over 2 billion, fully 20%, of public transportation customers in the United States. Between customized information design and purpose-built hardware fabrications, CHK America is providing solutions for many of the largest multi-modal transit agencies in the US from WMATA in Washington DC to DART in Dallas Texas, to LA Metro in Los Angeles, California.