Transport for London has recently introduced interactive posters to help commuters find their way around the city as part of its Safer Travel at Night campaign. Situated at busy underground stations, the posters are fitted with an infra-red port that can beam information directly to mobile phones - when the handset is held beside a glowing red icon, the embedded port then passes on a telephone number that the user can call to receive information about the safest route home.

The campaign, which began Monday 29th November, is intended to help Londoners, especially women, avoid trouble on the way home; in particular it aims to cut the number of sexual assaults by drivers of unlicensed minicabs. Nigel Marson, head of group marketing at Transport for London (TfL), said the posters were useful because they work outside the mobile phone networks. “They can work in previously inaccessible areas, such as underground stations, which is obviously a huge advantage in a campaign of this sort,” he said.

The benefits of the scheme are, however, somewhat undercut by its limited nature: the posters are aimed exclusively at women trying to get home late at night, there are only 25 in total and the campaign is ending on Boxing Day. Furthermore, the posters aren’t particularly striking. A cursory survey by our intrepid reporter revealed a total of 0 ‘interactions’ over a half-hour period. But if a commuter does decide to interact, the infra-red on their phone must first be activated. Quite a hindrance - a process which is certainly more involved than simply manually inputting a number into the phone. All of which renders the advantages of the scheme rather questionable - surely a simple phone number displayed on the poster would have been more helpful?