Ever been riding your motorcycle through a busy tunnel (in particular, Blackwall tunnel) and thought ‘wow, it’s absolutely rammed in here. If the worst were to happen, how would emergency services get anywhere!’ as you’re riding through the middle of busy rush hour traffic? Surely not just me?
Well, designer Syu Wei Chen seems to have had that exact thought - and decided to get sketching up when he got home rather than moan about it on social media. He's a better man than me.
The result was this: the Tunnel Keeper. A fire-engine-inspired electric motorcycle that can be used for all manner of incidents that can occur underground. Key here is that it can exploit the same gaps us motorcyclists can.
As well as making it possible to navigate between blocked-up traffic to get to the scene of a fire, it’s able to reach injured motorists that would otherwise be unreachable by large machinery.
Submitted to the Core 77 design awards and receiving the ‘Student Notable Transportation Award’, Syu Wei Chen also devised an entire strategy and process for how the Tunnel Keeper would be used in an emergency.
Fitted with a water mist system, Compressed Air Foam System and a ‘smoke exhaust system’ to disperse smoke as it progresses, the electric concept bike will be able to connect to fire hydrants at the scene and carry any injured parties on the removable stretcher.
Is this the best electric motorcycle concept you've ever seen, or what?
Full details of the function of this bike can be found on the Core 77 page - it’s a really good read.
It’s surprising that we’ve made it to 2021 and nobody has seemingly thought of this idea before - it makes far too much sense. Credit to Syu Wei Chen, great work!
Source: Motorcycles News (German)
