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Good Design or Bad Design? This Ladder Safety Feature

By Rain Noe - March 24

in UX | Tools & Craft

W.steps is the Swedish company that makes that compact telescoping ladder (previously known as Telesteps).

Ladders are known danger points on jobsites, so "safety is built right into the design," the company writes. "Our Safe Locking system uses bright red indicator tabs so you can instantly see when each rung is securely locked."

However, I think the visual cues that the user is meant to read are quite poor. This is the difference between unlocked and locked:

First off, the difference between the two positions is too subtle. Secondly, I think the designers have squandered the usage of red as an indicator. Red universally means "stop," so with any safety feature, seeing any red should tell you that something needs sorting out before you proceed. But in this case, the more red you see, the better?

Conversely, you could argue that the designers chose red not to mean "stop" but because it is high visibility. What say you? Is this good or bad design?

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Einar Blixhavn

a month ago

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The obvious solution to indicating it is locked correctly, would be to have a green area on the red tab that is only visible when the locking mechanism clicks in place. I.e. red=not safe, green=safe.

The biggest sin in ergonomy, is going against conventions. Ambiguous communication is in itself a safety risk. So using red as a safety colour, and it in addition being ambiguous because only one colour is used is not a good design decision. Having a green spot that is hidden when the lock is not engaged, and revealed when it is engaged, would be non-ambigous ( if you see green, it is safe) and it would follow conventions.

Last week, I was attaching a trailor to a car. It had a red pin, that popped up to reveal a green ring when the lock was engaged. I understood intuitively that the green meant safe.

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Good Design or Bad Design? This Ladder Safety Feature

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