Public Space Fanatic

Product and Ideas for Public Space

Category: Bicycle Corral

The Experiential Public Space 2

 

Experiential public spaces to succeed require a variety of different activities throughout the day. Bike-able and walk-able activities within the space should be a priority.   Neighborhood coffee shops, restaurants and retail shops can provide a catalyst for walkable traffic. Bistro seating and curbside parklets with tables, chairs and planters will enhance the streetscape experience and expand the seating capacity of any eating or drinking establishment.

One word about parklets. Many communities are spending large sums of money for custom designed and engineered parkets. Parklets have become popular enough that many companies are now offering prefabricated parklet kits. These prefabricated parkets kits contain pedestal supports for the deck surfaces, corner post, planters screens; rectangular planters, horizontal stainless aircraft cable or decorative laser cut fence panels. These parklet cost substantially less than the custom versions and are designed to be seasonally assembled and disassembled for snow removal during the winter.

Create pedestrian and bike-able destinations with streetscape parklets. Add umbrellas to the parklets and combine multiple stall bike corrals or bike racks, decorative planters and safety bollards to the space near and around the parklet to build public vibrant gathering places with public amenities. multiple stall bike racks will encourage bike riding to the destination and reduce the stress on local parking.

Bike shelters are still relatively rare in mixed use or streetscape environments largely because they don’t match local architectural styles. However contemporary bike structures entering the market are challenging the old bike shelter norms. High density two level bike parking or offset bike parking systems combined with bike shelters can provide massive amounts of bike parking in a small foot print. Bike shelters can remove the visual clutter associated large unruly randomly parked bikes

The experiential public also demands shade in the form of natural trees, shelters, windscreens or umbrellas. Shade is often overlooked in public spaces but places without shade usually don’t contain many people. Umbrellas perfectly suited to public spaces are the large cantilever or side-post surface mounted umbrellas. Large rotating or pivoting umbrellas can provide a large amount of shade throughout the day since the shade canopy can be rotated to maximize the amount of shade relative to the location of the sun. The large umbrellas that are available with surface mounted or embedded installation options are preferable since they won’t blow away and they eliminate the small table inserted umbrellas that impact direct visual contact with everyone at the table.

Do you have additional ideas that should be incorporated into experiential public spaces. If so, we’d like to hear from you.

On and Off Street Bike Parking

Aspen Bike Shelter

On and off street bike parking is definitely on the rise. Along with the rise in bike parking, there’s an interest in more creative and interesting bike racks. Along main street, inverted U hoop rack were the default standard. Fast forward today, we’re seeing cycle racks that create words and phrases, promote café’s and restaurants brands, brand shopping districts and market museums.

In the early stages of on-street bike parking, multiple hoop racks were combined via u-channel rails to create freestanding bike corrals. The desire to create bike parking that was more interesting led to bicycle corrals designed to look like cars, later fish and now you can let your imagine run wild. On street bike parking once again has transformed it’s self into more interesting objects – a string of bike looking bike racks, paper clips and other interesting objects.

One tool in the off street bicycle parking equation that has been missing is the combination of bike corrals and bike shelters. Cyclists are interested in the combination, but finding pre-engineered shelters designed for the urban environment can be tricky. The current bike shelter offerings tend to be bulky and un-inspired and their limited sizes can be a challenge.

But the Aspen, Pergola and Vizor pre-fabricated bike shelters may be changing that scenario. All three shelters have contemporary urban aesthetics. The Aspen and Pergola feature woodgrain aluminum powder coating that is quite suitable for upscale communities and historic districts. The Vizor stands out as a beacon of architectural design.

Another option that appear to have limited interest but could double or triple the amount of bike parking in high-density bike parking areas is the marriage of vertical and two tier bike parking systems with bike sheds. Vertical bike storage is being used extensively in apartments, condominiums and offices but has had limited success in other environments. Many standard bike shelters on the market will accommodate vertical bike parking.

On and off street bike parking is very much in demand.