At Open Gov Hack Night in the Transportation group the update on divvy was a new graph, more wants as to bringing Ventra and Divvy together, and the Solowheel. Open Gov is located on the 12th floor in the Merchandise Mart building. The hours start at 6 pm till 10 pm. Different topics are discussed and everyone and anyone is welcome.
Ben is trying to figure out how many people are upset by bikes and docks unavailability, in doing so he made his attempt to try and create a graph for the group to study on the Divvy docks.Link to Graphs . The database of dockings and checkouts by station and what time of the day they occurred is not recent rather on the first Divvy data dump.
Divvy Study Graphs
The first tab is Divvy as it stands
Commute Time Peaks shows the activity during the day as to how many bikes are in use per hour.
Imbalances leads to problems shows the locations of stations and how many bikes are returned or checked out throughout the day.
Imbalances arise during the day shows the level of imbalance at each station. Red is the danger of stations being empty. Green is full. Blank (white) is no activity and Grey is a dock that is balanced.
City map over time still needs work done. The area of check-ins and check-outs should have the same area but does not. Ben and group cannot explain the difference but Ben thinks maybe there’s a sampling/bucketing by 10 minute intervals.
The group discussed bringing Ventra and Divvy together. The group discussed the possibility of using the ventra cards to checkout Divvy bikes. This would be easier in terms of making transportation easier and faster so that people are able to just swipe the card and go. This also eliminates the time and complexity of waiting to get the bike out and having to wait for the confirmations of the bank when you would already know it will pass through.
The Solowheel
On another note have you heard of the Solowheel? The solowheel has a 1,000- watt electric motor that rotates the wheel, a lithium-ion battery that powers the electric motor and a gyroscope (rotation sensors) that helps the user stay balanced while moving. The solo wheel has a price of about $1,000 or if you search hard enough I’m pretty sure you can find a lower price. [youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rqyUdxhiqow?rel=0]
This electric unicycle is very cool and looks hard to drive but not at all. Gino Bernardi a participant of the group says it took him 30 minutes to have a steady balance but says it can take people and average of one hour or more to get the hang of it. Bernardi is concerned that riding the solowheel through Chicago might be a challenge for others because of the potholes and unleveled sidewalk. However, he is confident in his ability to ride it around the Windy City.
Aaron asked if people would like to ride it? Bonnie said the way adoption would work, would be like tours and see it catching on as a consumer product.
One of the questions asked was why would somebody buy solowheel/electric skateboard over an electric bicycle? Gino says that its more portable. And it is have you seen the folding E-Bikes they have to fold and with the solowheel there is no folding necessary.
Eli’s question is how does the speed compare to a bike? Gino says it has a max of of 10 mph and thats enough.
The benefits of using this would be that it is portable. If there is anything in this world that people love is portable things. Portable phones, portable computers and now portable transportation. You can take it anywhere you want and plus it can always stay by your side on the bus, under your desk, and even inside your home in your closet.
To Get Involved
Transportation is open to many topics. If you would like to share your opinions or start a new topic in the Transportation group come joins us at Open Gov Hack Nights.
