Last week I wrote a couple of blogs about how I have no idea what I'm doing. From trying to overcome some creative mind block to not being interested in anything at all, I felt stuck and had horrible visions of it coming to my last week here at uni and me submitting a blank piece of paper.
Well, finally, I have a direction—no actual idea yet, but direction at least. From a young age an interest that I've carried with me is that of two-wheel transport (you can read more about that here) and now that I'm learning to ride a motorbike, this is an area that I would like to research further into and design for.
For people that don't understand how learning to ride a motorcycle works, unlike when learning to drive a car, you can't have a passenger with you. To obtain your provisional you need to pass what's called your Compulsory Basic Training (CBT), and this allows you to ride any motorbike up to a specific engine size by yourself with learner plates on. Your CBT can only take a day to complete, meaning that people with next to no experience can sit this test and be legal to ride a motorbike on public roads.
Now, on the basis that even the most experienced riders are 65x more likely to be in an accident or killed on the roads than those in a car, people hitting the streets with only a couple hours experience isn't the safest thing ever.
Bikes also work quite a bit differently from a car. The gears are weird, indicators don't cancel, and cars just don't treat them with the same amount of respect they would like most other road users, so bikers that have only just started riding need to bare all that in mind.
I want to design something that helps bikers feel more confident on the road. Possibly something that helps learner bikers, wannabe bikers, or even experienced bikers who have maybe suffered a crash or unfortunate accident. I'm not going to claim that I can design something to bring that 65x higher accident rate down to zero, or even budge it. Still, I would like to design something that can at least distil confidence in some bikers and hopefully lead to them being better riders.
This project will require quite a lot of research. I plan on talking to bikers of all ages (19 through to 65+), learner bikers, bikers who have been in crashes, rider training schools, the lot. As I said earlier, I have no idea what I'm going to design at this stage, but I feel that's quite a good thing - I've got a blank canvas and I can design whatever on earth I want.
If you're interested in keeping up to date with my honours project, please do subscribe to the blogs. Also, if you're a biker, please do get in touch here so I can bombard you with questions.
Thank you!
Cover Photo Image:
A multi helmet light that improves bikers visibility from behind - A uni project from a few years ago.
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