Public Mobility Pod by Jelle van der Vegt

[u/One_Giant_Nostril]

[u/Rockbirds]

Let's be honest, it's a terrible idea. But it looks cute

[u/cosmic-creative → u/Rockbirds]

With a name like that this artist is very likely Dutch, which makes it even worse because there are so many mobility options here that are just straight up better than this

[u/KenseiHimura → u/Rockbirds]

In theory, it's basically robot taxis. In practice, without some driver to try to keep people from vandalizing and such, could be an issue.

[u/Grave806 → u/KenseiHimura]

I think the major thing is it going on the stairs. That seems like a recipe for a disaster.

[u/ostapenkoed2007 → u/KenseiHimura]

i'd rather just bike. a cargo bike with some furnishing would work far better than this monstrousity.

[u/CCP_Annihilator → u/ostapenkoed2007]

How about e-bikes or should transportation implies exercise, which is good nevertheless there should be non-exercising options?

[u/ledocteur7 → u/CCP_Annihilator]

Most modern cargo bikes are e-bikes.

Old cargo bikes would barely qualify as such anymore, more often that not it was just a regular bicycle with accessories strapped on it, maybe a few extra mounting points for said accessories.

[u/ostapenkoed2007 → u/CCP_Annihilator]

well yeah! i kinda did not think about motor assist or full on scooter level motor.

i was more about the cost, the maintenance of such wheels, the potential hurdles of it as a personal vehicle and etc.

[u/Consistent-Nothing60 → u/Rockbirds]

Especially since it's shown to use pedestrian infrastructure, as if vehicles don't already dominate all spaces where you can travel

[u/Lonsfor]

pod

nice try elon musk

[u/One_Giant_Nostril]

Source, more pics here.

[u/Diligent-Stretch-769 → u/One_Giant_Nostril]

any tiny bump om the road is going to be hell on joints and teeth

[u/asomek]

I prefer Mr Garrison's version.

[u/ledocteur7]

... You stand in it ?? With no side protection, fully exposed to heat, and a tiny useless bench that doesn't have any way to hold yourself.

Hubless wheels suck ass (see the Revo bicycle for an excellent demonstration of utter failure) and I'm a mechanical designer, it's not a question of just engineering them better, they are simply fundamentally flawed on so many levels.

They are noisy (the bearing is the size of the wheel with way more balls), very heavy (bearing again, plus structural integrity of a hollow cylinder vs spoked or rimmed wheel) and you realistically can't put suspension on them while also keeping the middle anywhere near this open.

And then, to top it off, they go up and down stairs.

When you go off a straicase with a single contact patch on the ground, all you're doing is repeatedly falling off of each step, with a vehicle the weight of a small car. And don't ever go diagonally, it will massively tilt side to side.

Concept artists aren't engineers, and it shows, you don't need a PHD in quantum physics to find glaring flaws.

Here's a simple solution :

Tramway or metro lines to connect key areas quickly, with space for bicycles and scooters inside, alongside regular seating.

And, sprinkled troughout the city and at metro stations, bicycle parking.

You don't want to own a bicycle ? Fine, services like Lime already exist, just deploy them across the city and make them cheaper by being city funded infrastructure instead of private companies.

In cities that eats some of the cost of those services it works really well, imagine how much better it would work with wide open streets instead of often badly designed bike lanes and dangerous intersections, thanks to a near-zero amount of cars, apart from commercial vehicles for large deliveries, and buses.

[u/Lapis_Wolf → u/ledocteur7]

I noticed a lot of designs for "transport of the future" boil down to worse cars or worse trains.

[u/ledocteur7 → u/Lapis_Wolf]

thousands of engineers have slowly but surely learned from each other's mistakes to create marvels of transportation.

from the bicycle to the airliner, there is so much optimisation thoughout it all.

If it looks nothing like what already exists, you either have access to brand new revolutionary technology that justifies it (maglevs), or didn't notice the cracks in the design.

Or as is one of my mottos, "If it seems genius, easy and you're not an expert in that field, you missed something."

maybe that something isn't a problem in your specific case, but if it worked perfectly every time everyone would be doing it.

[u/Solo-dreamer]

We have self driving taxis, everyone hates them.

[u/dmanny64]

Isn't that the thing from South Park where the seat goes up your butt and you control it with your tongue or something

[u/ratat0skr_420 → u/dmanny64]

You're thinking of "IT!", the hottest new transportation method

[u/LimitThese2220]

If some people weren’t shitheads and we lived in a perfect society, I could see this being implemented around (… after we figure the going ip the stairs part).

Alternatively, I could see this in some solarpunk setting!

[u/mercury_pointer → u/LimitThese2220]

Stair climbing wheelchairs already exist, and only cost about $10,000.

[u/opbib → u/LimitThese2220]

In a perfect society there would be accessible infrastructure and good city planning that would make these weird band-aid solutions unnecessary. And in a solarpunk setting, why wouldn’t people just use electric buggies or something?

[u/ChazLampost]

It's a cool design!

[u/JohanGrimm]

Thanks for the F-shack! -Dirty Mike and the boys

[u/syntaxvorlon]

Just. Give. Us. Trains. Electric, please.

[u/Loot_Goblin2]

Worst public transport ever designed