Providence Police Chief Dean Esserman speaks with Jr Neville Songwe before the unveiling of the newly designed dashboard for patrol cars.

THE PROVIDENCE JOURNAL / Andrew Dickerman

PROVIDENCE — It was intriguing, hiding there under a light blue cover.

Yes, it was a car, no doubt. But as visitors to the Public Safety Complex milled about, they wondered what the automotive innovation they had been promised would consist of.

The mayor and police chief did not keep them in suspense very long. In an unveiling not unlike the debut of a new line of cars from Detroit, the officials yesterday pulled the wraps off a shiny white police cruiser with gleaming black tires.

Inside the otherwise typical cruiser was a reconfigured dashboard that Mayor David N. Cicilline and Police Chief Dean M. Esserman claim could be a prototype for the cruisers of the future. Lending a hand was the dashboard’s proud planner, Jr Neville Songwe, a young industrial designer and a son of retired civil servants in Cameroon, Africa.

The dashboard even has a spiffy brand name: Brijo, composed of parts of the names of Songwe’s parents, Brigette and Joachim.

The streamlined dashboard integrates all the functions of a modern cruiser in what its promoters say is a more compact, more efficient, safer and more comfortable manner.

Built into the dashboard are the components that have been clogging the front seat of cruisers — the radios and the computer — and making police officers more prone to injury in an accident when they are thrown against the hard metal braces of the equipment. With the jumble of equipment no longer jutting out of the dash, an officer can more easily exit through the passenger side door if necessary in an emergency.

In a dome atop the dashboard is an improved camera, which shoots a photo of the license plate of a suspect vehicle and then automatically increases its range of view so that it records an officer’s interaction with civilians when he or she gets out.

In the middle of the dash is a touch-screen computer — Providence cruisers right now do not have touch screens — with a keyboard that swings out from underneath and swivels so that someone in the driver’s or passenger’s seat has ready access.

The steering wheel provides easy built-in access to many of the controls: The driver can work the computer, emergency lights, camera, radio and other functions without reaching for anything, allowing more attention to driving and possible signs of trouble.

And in the glove box area is a place to stow summons books and the like. If the future dictates it, that location could be the place to install a computer printer.

The technological array in the front seat area is a far cry from what police officers confronted even as recently as the late 1980s, recalled Patrolman Peter Rocchio, one of the officers assigned to drive the test model. In those days there were two toggle switches, one for the bubble-style emergency lights on the roof and one for the siren. And there was a radio, with its dials and switches.

The dashboard is the result of a three-year-old request by Roger Mandle, president of the Rhode Island School of Design, who asked Cicilline and Esserman to cooperate with Songwe’s desire to redesign the front seat area of police cruisers.

Songwe was allowed to ride with police officers, setting up cameras to record their every move. He was given two beaten-up cruisers with which to experiment, one of which he and his team at his startup company, Joneso Design, of Central Falls, chopped up with a saw. Police supervisors gave him a lot of their time. And Cicilline hosted meetings in his office with state economic-development officials in an effort to help the youthful entrepreneurs get financing.

Finally, Songwe and his colleagues were allowed to take a working cruiser and to install their reconfigured dashboard.

“The first rolling model of this new car,” as Esserman described it, was displayed yesterday. Beginning in a few days, police officers will put it to the test, on regular patrol, for several weeks.

Then Esserman plans to sit down with Songwe and his supporters to discuss ways that the prototype can be produced on a cost-effective scale. For his part, Songwe dreams that perhaps his studio not only could design the dashboards of cruisers, but manufacture them for sale, too.

“I hope Detroit hears,” Esserman declared, “that one day we hope that what you will see today will be known as the Providence model, a new type of police car built around officers, for officers, with their safety and work in mind.”

“It was and is a brilliant idea,” Cicilline exclaimed.

Songwe said he has brought his idea this far with seed money from his family and venture capitalists; there has been no dollar outlay by city or state government. Significantly more investment will be required if there is to be a chance to manufacture and sell the units.

Joining the ceremony was Dawn Barrett, RISD dean of architecture and design, who said Joneso is a “fine example of the increasing number of RISD studios that focus on the design needs of users” locally, nationally and internationally.

She lauded Songwe’s “inventive design work” and pronounced the resulting product “a testament to the importance and potential of good design. … We are pleased that this project may benefit Providence’s Finest.”

gsmith@projo.com