It’s an aquarium. No, it’s a bus shelter.

They have been made into a ski lift to promote the Winter Olympics and a giant toaster oven to promote hot breakfast sandwiches.

 

And now there's a bus shelter that's been turned into what looks like an aquarium.

 

Its roof is covered in sea kelp, giving waiting bus riders the feeling that they're underwater. 

 

The sides of the shelter are decorated with pictures of sardines, making it appear as though a school is swimming past.

 

But it's the giant touchscreen that turns the experience into something truly memorable.

 

It uses a three-dimensional augmented reality device to make users feel as though they're romping with the jellyfish and sea turtles pictured on the screen.

 

The shelter stunt is a promotion for the Monterey Bay Aquarium currently running in 13 shelters in San Francisco. 

 

Every year Engine Company 1, the aquarium's agency, is asked to come up with a unique alternative media experience to promote the aquarium.

 

In the past, Engine Company 1 has turned a subway tunnel into the "Tunnel of Love" and sent out a truck with a wifi-enabled scuba game.

 

This year the agency decided to try out some new technology, the digital bus shelters that Clear Channel Outdoor had just launched in San Francisco.

 

"Our mission was to create an interactive augmented reality experience where users would be submerged into the ocean and interact with the sea life," says Nick Fairbairn, media director at Engine Company 1. 

 

Mounted on the left side of the bus shelter, the 6-foot tall digital interactive display invites bus patrons to touch it to encounter, as the screen promised, "150 Feet of Awesome." 

 

"For example, the more the users move their arms around, the more bubbles form on screen. Another example is as the sea nettle jellies swim across the screen, users can wave their hands and the jellies pulse away and around the user," Fairbairn says. 

 

Users can also pose for a photo with the sea creatures, which is then mounted on a personalized postcard that can be saved to a smartphone or uploaded to Facebook or Twitter.

 

Though the phone portion of the campaign, which InWindow Outdoor also worked on, was not new, the augmented reality was. 

 

Engine Company 1 also negotiated with Clear Channel to borrow a mobile version of the bus shelter that had been used for internal testing purposes and take it on the road. 

 

The "150 Feet of Awesome" experience has stopped at concerts and other outdoor events in the Bay area since the bus shelter campaign debuted its eight-week run in early July. 

 

The campaign works because it turns something dreary, waiting for the bus, into something extraordinary, diving into the deep with sea creatures.

 

And the touchscreen is doing a great job drawing people in.

 

During the first two and a half weeks after the shelters debuted, the touchscreens had already recorded more than 20,000 interactions.