Loco Lavatory

The brief had singled out female loco pilots as the group the existing design does not account for. The interviews are where that became specific enough to design against.

Primary data: a site visit to Tughlaqabad Loco Shed, where we saw the current unit in place and interviewed two female locomotive pilots. Both chose to remain anonymous and asked not to be quoted directly.

What unlocked this was spatial. The cabin layout lets the lavatory envelope extend above elbow height on one side. That reclaims the space beside the unit and above the deadweight that the current design leaves empty, and it went into the final concept as room to turn around — the thing pilots said they missed most.

Ideation ran from footprint studies through to full isometric passes, with the sink and pan drawn as one continuous surface rather than fixtures bolted onto a box. Anywhere two parts met was somewhere dirt could catch, so the geometry lost as many of those joins as it could.

Roominess wasn't a comfort feature here. Pilots already plan their water intake around a unit they would rather not enter, so how much room it gives them is what decides whether it gets used at all.

The same shell ships in three variants, so the retrofit fits whichever pan style a given cabin already has: