CycleHack comes to Vancouver
Idea incubator looks for simple ways to remove barriers to cycling
For many cyclists, big trucks and buses are scary to ride beside, largely because it’s difficult to tell where the blind spot is. What would happen if you could mark large vehicles so cyclists could avoid travelling in the shadow of the blind spots?
In another example, say you’re planning to meet your friends in the pub but you also want to show everyone your new handbag. When you get on your bike, you quickly realize that biking and handbags don’t go together. What if there was a strap to turn your handbag into a messenger bag?
And finally, cyclists who wear skirts often find themselves routinely exposing their knickers to passersby. What if someone designed an accessory to maintain your modesty and turn your skirt into shorts?
The blind spot wrap, handbag strap and Penny in Yo’ Pants are all small but significant solutions that have been recently developed to some of the subtle barriers to biking. The biggest hit so far is the Penny in Yo’ Pants, a simple fastener based on a penny and an elastic band. A video about the product has three million hits.
All three solutions were developed out of a unique biking event called CycleHack. It was held for the first time last year in founding city Glasgow as well as Beirut and Melbourne. Since then, the idea has caught on around the world. This year, CycleHack has expanded to 25 cities including Vancouver.
What exactly is CycleHack? According to one of its three cofounders, CycleHack is designed to empower people to take a proactive, do-it-yourself approach to reduce the barriers to cycling.
“Generally, when you talk to someone about barriers to cycling, the conversation quickly (moves to) cycle lanes and cycling infrastructure,” said Matthew Lowell, who moved to Vancouver from Glasgow last October.
“When you dig a bit deeper and find out how they fit cycling into their lives and how they use bikes, you find out far more specific little barriers, which stop people from getting on their bike.”
The other founders of CycleHack are Sarah Drummond and Johanna Holtan.
Lowell said the founders have all been taken aback by the response to CycleHack. They thought they were organizing an event in a single city — not starting something that would spread around the world.
“We’ve been on somewhat of a wild ride,” he said.
“The success of those three events has exploded and catalyzed the whole global movement that we’re calling it now.”
The CycleHack marathon weekend, starting today, is described as a 48-hour intensive event meant to bring people together and generate ideas and solutions.
“Within 48 hours, we’re tooling up people in order to realize ideas and also get them out into the city and try them out and get some feedback quickly for a very low cost,” he said.
CycleHack is also online through city-specific websites as well as its Open Source Online Catalogue where all the hacks — the new methods and innovations — can be uploaded and hosted in a Creative Commons, Open Source environment where anyone can see what’s there and build upon and improve an idea.
Lowell said while some of the solutions developed in CycleHack may have applications around the world, not all solutions fit all cities. “I think there are some barriers that are quite global — from how to fix a puncture to find safe places to lock up your bike — to more specific social barriers,” he said.
In Bangalore, India, for example, where CycleHack is taking place this weekend, a bicycle is seen as something you leave behind when you earn enough money and progress to buying a car. In that case, he suggested, maybe CycleHack will look at new ways to market biking so that people can use them without feeling like they’re taking a step down the social ladder.
CycleHack isn’t working at cross-purposes with city and social planners involved in designing cycling lanes and infrastructure, Lowell said.
“I think what CycleHack does maybe is slightly different to what government or larger organizations are doing,” he said.
“CycleHack is really taking a bottom up approach to addressing barriers. We’re literally involving ordinary citizens on the street.”
CycleHack starts at 6 p.m. at MakerLabs, 780 East Cordova. Tickets range from $25 for the weekend to $15 for the Show and Tell for which youths aged six to 19 pay $5 (children aged five and under are free). Go to cyclehackvan.tumbler.com for more details.