Balls of Tungsten Carbide...

Check out this video of new york bike messengers having a nice chilled ride through the quiet streets of the city.

Design Bikes...

Im on a bit of a design buzz this morning and I just remembered this bike design company that is doing very interesting things in terms of the types of materials they use and the attention to detail that seems to go into the bikes where function is concerned. They are called Biomega and are from Denmark where alot of wonderful design stuff seems to be going on lately. Usually with this sort of thing you never see them in the shops but I have actually seen these for sale in dublin. Great stuff.

Skangers would have a field day with this in Dublin.

Some day we'll all be living in shells:-)

Found this cool little rolling house on treehugger this morning. It looks a bit small but I love the concept. Add a solar panel a microturbine and a rain catchment system and youve got yourself a pretty cute pod house thingy. Personally I think it should be half a meter higher and half a meter wider (It doesnt look like the woman in the photo would be able to lie flat in it) with an entrance on the side but the idea is there to adapt. I want one. I wonder if I could tow it behind my bike. Actually isnt a tent more practical for that sort of thing, ok scrap that idea. But it does provide better security than a tent and it can float so I suppose there are advantages. Baby we've been looking for a new place recently what do you think?

Where is everybody?

I saw this on BoingBoing the other day and seeing as this is an environmentally themed site I decided it would be fitting to post. Basically what would happen if we all got up and left the planet to heal? Well at some point scientists pondered this scenario and made a chart to show us just what would happen. So now we know exactly what nature will do when we are wiped out by that virus from outer space im always warning everyone about. 50,000 years is a very short period of time in the greater scale of things.

The Lyon Public Bike Project...

Hi all,

This appeared in Wired a few months back so some of you may have seen it before since I have seen it in action and seen how well it works I felt I should mention it again to try to raise awarenes as it is a scheme that is working incredably well here. Basically there are Velo Stations where you insert your credit card and a public bike next to the payment machine is unlocked for you. The first half hour is free and after that you pay a small fee for use of the bike. When you are finished with the bike you drop it off at a free stand at a Velo station near your destination. There are literally thousands of these bikes now, the streets and parks are filled with happy cyclists availing of this service. Apparently there is a run on the bikes when the clubs close which can only mean one thing this being France and all, masses of tipsy people flying all over the place on bikes at two in the morning. You can read more about this cool project at the Wired link above.

Since arriving in France I have been amazed by the number of people who use those little silver folding scooters to get around, and I mean business people, students and kids. Lyon has many hills so it makes perfect sense, walk up the hill or take one of the many public transport solutions to the top and coast down the other side to you destination on your little silver scooter. While surfing this morning I came across this wicked folding bike in the del.icio.us popular section. Its designed by the british inventor Sir Clive Sinclair who many people remember for that weird impractical electric three wheeled thingy he was pimping in the 80s which failed to take off commercially. But I like his new idea very much, the wheels look a bit small but if the little scooter things work well here then something like this should to. It has a price tag of just under £200GBP which I feel is pretty reasonable and so I wish them every success. Anything that will get those dreaded horseless carriages off the streets is a good thing in my eyes.