ABSTRACT
This chapter presents the author’s observations derived from personal experience in the specification and evaluation of a number of control rooms. Examples are drawn from these cases and used as illustrations to highlight some human factors (HF) design considerations in control room design and the pitfalls that might be encountered typically in HF practice. Basic equipment in early control rooms comprises physical panel displays, some with controls incorporated, while others have separate control stations. Such control rooms may be found in refinery and nuclear power stations. Peripheral equipment may include some work tables, shelves for documentation and dot matrix printer(s). With the advent of desktop computers, replacement of physical panel displays with computer consoles began in the early eighties. Standalone consoles to control a single type of equipment (as opposed to controlling and trouble-shooting various equipment and processes) may be simpler to specify.
