It might sound like a character dreamed up by Dr. Seuss, but Google is banking that the could help transform the way we get around. Pairing a recumbent bubble bicycle and monorail, the Schweeb is among the five winners鈥攐ut of 150,000 submissions鈥攐f a call for ideas that could change the world. The goliath dot-com is awarding the Schweeb鈥檚 creators $1 million to test it in an urban setting. (Until then, anyone wanting to give it a go will have to hop over to New Zealand, where the Schweeb is an amusement park ride at the .)
鈥淭he cost of innovation in public transportation is often very high鈥攕ometimes in the billions of dollars,鈥 says Google spokesperson Jamie Yood. 鈥淲e looked for a concrete project where the funding available to us with Project 10^100 has the potential to yield impact. Schweeb鈥檚 innovative approach towards low-cost and environmentally friendly urban transport has the potential for significant impact in the future.鈥
The last time a company proclaimed an invention that would revolutionize urban transportation was 2001 when Dean Kamen announced his . (That machine made when the British businessman who recently bought the Segway company unfortunately died after riding his scooter off a cliff and into a river near his Yorkshire estate.) Kamen envisioned cities without cars and only Segways. That dream obviously didn鈥檛 come to fruition. Will the Schweeb have a better shot?
isn鈥檛 convinced. He writes:
鈥Google must have gotten 149,996 stupid suggestions for this to have gotten funding. Monorails are kind-of cool in that Disney-theme-park way, and recumbents are efficient bicycles--if entirely unsuitable for daily, urban cycling. But combining the two is something not even the worst sci-fi writer would conjure up. Can you imagine how sweaty and stinky these things would become? If I鈥檓 going to pedal something to get somewhere, it鈥檚 going to be using a bike that can actually turn and take me to my destination. Moreover, these things are bound to be slow, and will probably need a large staff of attendants, like a theme-park ride, to ensure that people get on and off safely.鈥
When the Segway was introduced, critics pointed to its lack of protection from the elements. The Schweeb鈥檚 bubbly design seems to have that particular problem covered, but the sweat factor could be a sticky issue.