a new Navigation tool For Bikes Gently Nudges Cyclists toward Their destination

unless your fortunate enough to reside in Copenhagen, the urban bike experience is still a pretty hazardous shuttle—and one that requires your full attention. Amongst street indicators, pedestrians, inattentive drivers and slender bike lanes (that ceaselessly double as bus stops), metropolis cyclists have enough to fret about while not having to tug out an iPhone for guidelines.

The product designers at London-based totally industrial design studio Map agree. As cyclists themselves, they ceaselessly bike to meetings collectively and would talk in regards to the ache of getting to forestall and look at your cellphone for navigation, says the agency’s design director Jon Marshall. through a client, Marshall met Mark Jenner and Tom Putnam, who were developing an app that factors cyclists towards their destination without giving flip-by-flip guidelines. Map agreed to design the hardware and BeeLine used to be born.

There are different units available in the market that offer instructions at a glance for safer navigation (we wrote about the pretty SmartHalo past this year), however BeeLine differs in that it does not dictate precisely where to go. instead, an arrow shifts subtly in direction of the destination like a compass needle, giving the bike owner the liberty to discover new routes alongside the best way. “we have now a pure experience of course and that course will get distorted in a cities the place the lanes curve and also you easily lose your method,” says Marshall. “This bargains a way of exploration and a approach to feel safer and empowered guidance, reasonably than constrained.”

The instrument itself was once designed with simplicity and affordability in mind. Made with an e-paper reveal and a silicon strap, the BeeLine straps to your handlebars when in use, and fits right into a protective case or on a keyring when its now not. “The display is low price and low power, so it may well stay in your bag for one to two months without having to recharge,” says Marshall. using the accompanying app to set their vacation spot and any waypoints, bicycle owner need only to glance down at the display to understand they are headed in the correct direction.

Having the liberty to seek out your individual manner seems best you probably have the time, but what about when you find yourself in a rush? Marshall says Map tested BeeLine side-by-aspect with cyclists the usage of Google maps and the go back and forth times have been primarily the identical. “there is a believability gap—folks suppose it takes longer [than Google Maps], however as long as you roughly understand town it’s just as fast,” he says, noting that after one technology did beat out the opposite, it was once regularly with the aid of one or two seconds on a half of hour ride. “We wished BeeLine to be a quite simple, pure product which is affordable for all bicycle owner. There are different improbable merchandise for flip-through-turn guidance, we wished this to offer something totally totally different.”

Put another way, BeeLine deals steerage but in addition encourages riders to belief their instincts and pure feel of route. In an age when expertise frequently does the entire be just right for you, this refined feel of friction is oddly refreshing. And who is aware of, it’s possible you’ll even learn your approach around.

BeeLine is available to again on Kickstarter now starting from round $33 for early chicken pledgers (shipping summer time 2016), and around $65 when it hits the market.