Cycling Visionaries Awards - Project Details

(B)VEST-BIKE Program

Tired of getting your bike stolen or of being forced to buy an old-used one, because a new bike wakes up the envy of others? Here is the solution. Become part of the VEST-BIKE Project and ride assured that your bike stays with you all the time. And not only that! This project will increase your personal safety while you ride and in case of a crash, thus, rising the bike ridership.

(B)VEST-BIKE

One of the main factors for not choosing bike as a transport mean is robbery. No matter if you decide to get the old-used bike or the brand-new bike of your dreams, still the threat of losing it lurks next to your ride. This project main objective seeks to reduce or eradicate bike stealing via the use of a vest-bike identification and, at the same, to increase riding safety for bikers. At the same time this vest will offer a self-identity to all bike riders to protect themselves between them and from the others.

The idea is simple. Keeping your bike theft-free and yourself safe requires only the use of a vest, while riding. The vest has three features:
1. ID NUMBER – a unique identification which relates the vest with a bike-numberplate, like in the cars.
2. REFLECTIVE- to increase visual awareness among others to prevent accidents.
3. AIR BAG – in case of a crash, when falling from the bike, an automated instant air bag will inflate protecting the body of the rider. Check its operation in the youtube links (just imagine it is with a bike).

If a police officer happens to see a biker with a vest identification which do not matches the numberplate of the bike, meaning that is not the original owner riding it, he is to stop immediately this person and to retain the bike. The recovered bike may be returned to its rightful proprietor, because the numberplate registry shows the address of him. Likewise, if your bike and vest are stolen at the same time, you could report it and the police could verify that you are the legitimate holder of it, under the numberplate database. Of course, please, don’t leave your vest unattended or store it in a locked compartment.

Of course the fashions side is something always to take into consideration. But imagine if all bike riders were using this vest, aware of its benefits, wherever they go. Then it wouldn’t make much of a difference, would it?

This project may only be carried out with the support of both, the local authorities and the bikers. The government would pay and provide to each bike rider the vest, with a distinctive hologram of authenticity not to be falsified, and the numberplate, matching exactly the vest identification. The bike users, in return, would wear this vest every time they travel by bike, for their own sake and that of their bike.

The reason for the government running with the costs of the vests is because if the bike users were to pay for this, a shift in bike ridership to other means of motorized transportation surely will happen. Besides, it should be within the authorities interests to procure sustainable and green cities to their residents, and the bike is an important detonator of all this.

And where would the money come from, then? The financing of the vests and numberplates would be carried out through:
1. the savings in the reduction of bike crash accidents treatments at hospitals
2. the major mobility (economical activities) within the city, because of the shift of commuters to bike ridership and/or
3. private sponsorship of social responsible committed companies, through publicity on the vests.
So easy it works!
This project welcomes the further comments and contributions of the interested ones.

*The images provided belong to their original creators. Here the link to them in order of appearance:
1. http://pichincha.quebarato.com.ec/quito/chalecos-reflectivos-de-seguridad-importados-accesorios-moto__744662.html
2. http://www.vanguardia.com/historico/109501-buscan-que-uso-de-chalecos-reflectivos-para-motociclistas-sea-todo-el-dia
3. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mo9Vlt5tGwY
4. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cfSPN83g2nc
5. http://kopalniawiedzy.pl/media/lib/35/speedvest_in_action_hi_res-85a7dc29d5a97b0586d45dfc26f273a5.jpg