Urbantrans ANZ

There are a lot of things I like about the Copenhagen Wheel – the hybrid bike wheel being developed by the team at MIT’s SENSEable City Lab.

Only a few of these things relate to the bike itself. So, again, it’s not about the bike. Literally, in this case. It’s about the wheel. And much more.

The Copenhagen Wheel is completely self-contained, and there is a lot going on inside that oh-so-Italian red hub (the MIT team is partnering with Ducati Energia of Italy after all). The wheel contains an electric motor, three-speed internal hub gear, batteries, a torque sensor, and a GPRS and sensor kit that monitors CO, NOx, noise, relative humidity and temperature. The Copenhagen Wheel can be added to your existing bike, turning that aging lug in your garage into a slick mobility machine straight from the future. The wheel harvests energy as you pedal and when you brake, and delivers it back to you when you need an extra boost.

However, the Copenhagen Wheel is more than just a hybrid bike propulsion mechanism, it is a cool hybridisation of several larger socio-technical trends.  The Copenhagen Wheel is controlled by your Smart Phone, via Bluetooth. The phone becomes your high-tech key and your smart dashboard, as it can unlock and lock your bike, change gears, select how much the motor assists you, and display relevant real-time information.

Here is where the Copenhagen Wheel concept gets interesting to me – because this is where it gets socially interesting, not just technically interesting. With the in-wheel sensors and the smart phone interface, suddenly your bike becomes a roving data collection and social connection machine. Track pollution to plan healthier routes. See your calories burned and set goals to cycle more and meet your health targets. See when your friends are nearby. The mash-up potential of this data platform could be huge. Especially when the data from many Copenhagen Wheel users collectively becomes a tool for crowdsourcing fine-grained urban data, and an enabler for “frequent flier” style marketing and community-building initiatives.

The big idea here is that the future of sustainability solutions is not likely to be about technology or about social or behavioural programs being developed in isolation. When the MIT team began this project, they started with a design brief that included both technical and social factors. Two of the four elements of the design brief for the wheel were technical. The last two were that (1) it should be your friend, and be able to tell you how well you're doing, and (2) it should have a social component that connects with your friends and encourages you to cycle.

The Copenhagen Wheel is set for commercial release in June 2011, at an estimated cost of US$600.

Check out the Copenhagen Wheel project website, which includes a great teaser video.

Where else are there opportunities to develop integrated technical / social sustainability solutions?