When it comes to retail bank branches, the industry tends to give mixed messages. We have certainly heard a lot about big banks--notably Bank of America--rationalizing the number of bank branches it intends to support across the country.

SNL Financial reported earlier this year that the total number of retail branches is likely to decline this year for the first time since 2002. Big mergers have accelerated the trend, lead by JPMorgan Chase and PNC.

But the idea of the bank branch will not wither and die. There may be fewer, but banks understand the ones that survive have to be better, and that increasingly means more reliance on new technologies.

At the same time, banks haven't given up investing in bank branch technology. Citigroup for one has come up with some innovative approaches to deploying consumer technology in branches.

Bank Systems & Technology notes an interesting development regarding Microsoft's Surface, which the software giant would like to position as an ideal technology for consumer branches. RBC has rolled out the technology in two branches, and a third is on the way. Surface offers a massive table top-like interface that's quite smart. Microsoft, for example, has experimented with developing a tool that allows people to put paper on the Surface display, which will then "read" the writing.

The trick of course will be to customize some great apps that take advantage of the technology to provide more than just a "gee-whiz" tool but also legitimate services. 

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