If walking vehicles were popularized how would they fit in among us?
If we designed something that made it as safe as a motorcycle to run at speeds of up to 75 MPH how would we fit it in among us?
What type of licenses would be required? Would they be street legal?
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A number of vehicles have already been produced that walk, notably by the Carnegie Mellon University Robotics department’s Ivan Sutherland and Mark Raibert (who later founded Boston Dynamics:)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xqMVg5ixhd0&feature=relmfu
Street legality as a rule depends not on the means of locomotion, but on safety features like bumpers, lights, horns, mirrors, and seat belts. Getting approval for that is a daunting task even for a well-funded car company since it involves among other things destroying several prototypes in crash testing. Creating a vehicle with legs moving fast enough to run at 75mph might be very dangerous as they can more easily get tangled than wheels.
Street legal they would not be quick, I think.
In the Netherlands, a few years ago, politics were even wary of making the Segway street legal.
Untill some police departments in some cities bought them for use of surveillance.
Do you mean something like this?
This question was inspired by traffic, and my own God given mech suit’s ability to walk faster than traffic.
Can’t wait for it. It would help a lot disabled people, young and old.
electric wheel chairs….pimped out with tops…....
@mazingerz88 you should watch this and skip ahead to 3:20. It’s the kind of thing that’s so amazing you almost can’t help but weep with joy.
I don’t really ever see this as a practical method of rapid transport. Wheels beat tank treads which beat walker legs.
I understand the part about walking vehicles, but I’m trying to figure out why anyone would be manufacturing one that could go that fast. That makes little sense to me. At slower speeds similar to walking, yes I see that.
But cars go that fast already and do it much more efficiently with a much lower (less dangerous) center of gravity. Something higher, with legs yet, is just inviting disaster. Why bother.
What happens in high winds or over bridges (like the Tappan Zee)?
There was enough fuss about SUVS and tipping problems several years ago due to the higher center of grav.
I don’t get it.
BTW. Dean Kamen already built, demonstrated, and manufactured a wheelchair which could raise disabled people up to regular height, go up and down stairs, over beach sand. A truly amazing device with gyroscopes built in for the stair climbing.
A brilliant piece of enormously helpful equipment with life changing abilities for the disabled, unfortunately now relegated to the dustbin of history for financial reasons.
Well it’s about my perpetual frustration over traffic. I am working right now to get to a place where I have a job I am comfortable with so I can just ride a bicycle to work/store and only use car transportation for things like travel or special occasions. Please everyone do the same! That would make any need for a running machine unnecessary.
But beyond that, an important part of my question might be asked better another way….and that question I will ask now…on a new thread.
Re: straddling buses:
On the down side: What if there’s an accident directly underneath it? Or if you want to make a turn and you’re stuck in traffic underneath it?
On the up side: It doesn’t seem too different from the days when trolley trains and cars shared the same road. People will just get used to it again, and it’ll seem perfectly normal.
@JaneraSolomon Chiba, very cool…indeed. I guess it is difficult to get run over by something suspended as well.
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