gcbb

Further development – looking at city-bikes

Posted by: gcbb on: March 13, 2008

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  I have been looking at the bike sharing system in Oslo as a possible context for my project. What appeals to me about this particular context is its connection to the local. The bike depots are placed locally and in well defined areas of the neighbourhood. The bikes themselves connects different areas in new ways, and stimulates exploration of new areas. Also using the bikes gives a community feeling, and a connection to other city-bike users you pas on the way. The System allows for interaction with more or less motivated people, and further the huge daily activity can generate a lot of data. About you, about the bike and about the system. What to do with this data is another thing. 

 

My proposal is blogging city-bikes. There are about a thousand bikes in Oslo at the moment, so maybe only a third or so of the bikes may be engaged. The bikes will be equipped with a GPS reciever, a camera and possibilities to upload the data collected. In use, the camera will take random photos  triggered by speed, location, transit, etc. The data can be compiled to concern the individual users, the individual bikes themselves, and mashed on top of maps, and used in timelaps films from destination to destination.

 

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 I have been discussing with Tom Igoe about different ways of going about to make this work. The easiest solution for a prototype will be to use a mobile-phone with a decent camera GPS receiver a programmable language (S 60) and mobile processing or another programming environment that matches.
 
Another concern I could look at is the actual interaction for the user to retrieve the data. The bikes should have their own ID, that could easily be read.
 
I think I should have some mentoring about this one…. More will follow.
 
  
 
 

 

1 Response to "Further development – looking at city-bikes"

[...] come to is to use the citybikes as a tool for mapping the city, and the local areas in the city. As I have said before, I consider the citybikes to be a resource far beyond mere means for transportation. They [...]

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About this blog:

I am a master student at the Oslo school of Architecture & Design in Norway. My studies are in industrial design, focused on interaction design and tangible interactions. This blog follows a studio course called "Touch - new local interfaces" that researches tangible interaction and networked objects specially through RFID technology. My projects investigates interactions in the public domain, and is working against services around bike-sharing systems. Feel free to comment! Gunnar Bothner-By

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