Transportation

THE COPENHAGEN WHEEL

Smart, responsive and elegant, the Copenhagen Wheel is a new emblem for urban mobility. It transforms ordinary bicycles quickly into hybrid e-bikes that also function as mobile sensing units.

SEE THE VIDEO AT http://hopedance.org/community-media/videos/359

The Copenhagen Wheel allows you to capture the energy dissipated while cycling and braking and save it for when you need a bit of a boost. It also maps pollution levels, traffic congestion, and road conditions in real-time.

SENSE and SUSTAINABILITY

Controlled through your smart phone, the Copenhagen Wheel becomes a natural extension of your everyday life. You can use your phone to unlock and lock your bike, change gears and select how much the motor assists you. As you cycle, the wheels sensing unit is also capturing your effort level and information about your surroundings, including road conditions, carbon monoxide, NOx, noise, ambient temperature and relative humidity. Access this data through your phone or the web and use it to plan healthier bike routes, to achieve your exercise goals or to meet up with friends on the go. You can also share your data with friends, or with your city - anonymously if you wish thereby contributing to a fine-grained database of environmental information from which we can all benefit.

ABOUT the PROJECT

The Copenhagen Wheel will be unveiled on December 15 at the COP15 United Nations Climate Conference. The project was conceived and developed by the SENSEable City Lab for the Kobenhavns Kommune. The prototype bikes were realized with the help of our technical partner Ducati Energia and funding from the Ministry for the Environment.

Progical Solutions LLC provided technical support for the iphone control of the bikes. The components of the project are an electric bicycle wheel that can be easily retrofitted into any regular bicycle and location and environmental sensors which are powered by the bike wheel and in turn provide data for a variety of applications. The Copenhagen Wheel project demonstrates that small intelligent implementations can lead to major changes. This work will be displayed at the 2009 Cop 15 UN Climate Summit where the next version of the Kyoto Protocol will be signed.

See the trailer at: http://www.hopedance.org/community-media/videos/359

Stepping outside my island hideout, I hoist the bamboo-stiffened tarp like a gaff-rigged mainsail and cleat it off to the side of the shed. In the soft interior light, the bike's clear plastic fairing throws off reflections with the promise of motorized adventure only two wheels can offer.

by Dave Atkins

To encourage more people to bike, ask women what they want. And make it safe for kids to ride their bikes to school. These approaches would dramatically increase the utilization of cycling as a mainstream activity.

According to an article in the October Scientific American, women are an "indicator species" for bike-friendly cities. Those of us who bike frequently are familiar with the lycra-clad warrior mindset and the urban bike messenger culture, but we are also familiar with comments like "I'm surprised your wife 'lets' you ride to work." We have learned to temper our tales of close calls and have adopted an extremely defensive approach to bike commuting--out of a necessity for survival.