is a seat wall as good as a bench (or better?)

I always use both, often I even place benches in front of the walls. Seatwalls are fine for short periods of time, but they certainly are not the most comfortable things. Unless you contour the cap, they can be downright painful for more than 5 minutes. Many benches are not much better. However, the proper bench cannot be replaced with a seatwall. Benches provide back support, a more comfortable seating surface, and arms. They are far more accessible and comfortable for use by those with physical issues, I almost consider it an ADA issue.

I know they are expensive, I generally use a bench that is $1300 (the most expensive that particular manufacturer makes) which consists of iron endcastings and curved wood seating and back. I use wood because it is a cooler surface to sit on in sunny areas. You can get benches pretty cheap nowandays, but you have to worry about durability. A good bench should last at least 30 years, and if installed properly, difficult to remove.

As for the walls, when coupled with benches, I actually use them as mostly as leaning walls, which are a bit higher. Those so inclined can still hop up a few inches and sit on them, as the usual 18″ is a bit too low to be comfortable for many.

have you ever tried to lay down on a seatwall? One of the reasons I was told to use seat walls is that “bums” cannot sleep on a seatwall, the fall off, a bench with a back allows a bed for people to sleep on in public spaces, this is also the reason for backless benches and curved top seat benches in public spaces.

Sure, go ahead. The 18″ I refer to is the standard seating height, width is always variable based on materials and aesthetics. Depending on the application, As far as the comment of the ‘bums’…it really doesn’t matter if there are benches or not, bums sleep anywhere. I once had to walk around one sleeping in the MIDDLE of the MAIN SIDEWALK of Independence Plaza in Philly, after the renovation. If it is a concern, order shorter benches (5’), backless benches (but with arm rests) or order benches with bum-bars or a unit with an extra support casting placed in the middle of the bench. I’ve seen homeless sleep on walls as well if they are wide enough. Being that this application is that of a rest stop, I don’t think this is an overriding concern as it would be at a marginal urban site.

look at you getting real world experiences! 🙂

I had no idea that homeless sleeping on seating is a problem in highway rest stops – definitely other problems, but this is the first I have heard of the homeless frequenting these areas. Which leads to the obvious question …. are there other activities that may be the inspiration for not using benches and substituting seating walls? I can’t help but wonder if seating walls vs. benches may be a deterrent to some of those other activities.

A bench is a bench, but a seating wall can be a bench, a fence, a guardrail, a strong visual builder of space, a guide for circulation, and sometimes it retains and/or controls runoff flow as well as many other things. They are also very built in structures which can make them very much joined into the landscape where a bench typically looks like something isolated on the landscape. This is especially true if the walls are built out of natural local stone.

I’ve not designed rest areas (bath house for a nudist colony, but never a rest area), and have never seriously considered the factors that would go into choosing the right seating for a particular rest stop. You just made me think about seating walls and benches a lot more than I normally do which made me want to point out some differences that may or may not be the reasons why they are used in your state’s rest stops. I don’t know that one is better than another, just that there are different possibilities.

I should think that your desired seating experience is not unique and should be one of the more important aspects (man there are too many puns and plays on words to avoid here) in developing a seating strategy. Maybe they smply do not want people to stay there very long.

Does the DOT have and do they share the design criteria that they want used for rest area design to their design staff? It leads to the question of whether they keep their design people isolated from fully developing the design or whether they force cookie cutter design criteria state wide. It seems that it would make more sense to keep everyone involved in sharing questions and ideas from not only the top down, but from the bottom up. If there are reasons for doing or not doing what they are doing, they should at least communicate them so that everyone understands why whether you agree with them or not..