Indonesia provides several modes of transportation and one that is still widely used is bicycles. Big cities, such as Bandung, have even turned it into a lifestyle.
Cyclists are usually utilising technological features that make their ride worthwhile, such as Global Positioning System (GPS) to be familiar with the route, and heart rate meter and calorie meter for the health.
Additionally, Internet of Thinks (IoT) should also be considered and will offer benefits that will maximise the cycling activities.
The Project
According to a recent press release, the IoT Laboratory and Digital Economic Development of the Bandung Institute of Technology (ITB) developed Garuda Bike.
Garuda Bike is a bike sharing program that utilises a combination of different technologies that include IoT, GPS, automatic systems and alarms.
The aim of this program is to use bicycles in areas where motorised vehicles are not available, such as campuses and special bicycle areas, particularly in certain restricted areas.
It is imperative that the bicycles are used in an area where there is a Wi-Fi connection. This will allow the server to collect data on activities carried out during cycling.
This collected data, also known as Big Data, will be analysed to get various predictions related to health, patterns of community activities, levels of air pollution and even predictions of disasters.
How it works?
The Garuda Bike has three kinds of sensors installed that will be used to gather the data. These sensors are log sensors, GPS and alarms.
Samples of information collected may include how often the population exercises, what are the usual routes used by cyclists, and even the level of pollution surrounding the area where the biker is.
Aside from the aforementioned functions and technologies, this smart bicycle is also cheap.
The information gathered by the Garuda Bike will go through three main stages: sensing, understanding and acting.
Sensing gathers the data through the sensors on the bike. Understanding is related to analysis of the data and its results while acting is doing action in response to the data gathered.
For instance, through the app, it can be determined which areas are crowded and should be avoided. The cyclist, with this knowledge, will therefore be able to avoid it.
Moreover, knowing which area is crowded will be beneficial for those interested to sell food or drinks.
The Plans
The Garuda Bike project is collaborating with the Bandung City Transportation Agency and an Indonesian telecommunications company for the network development.
The project is now ready to be tested and the prototype ready to be sold in July 2019.
For its testing, the plan for Garuda Bike is to be tested on a campus scale at the University and in cooperation with the Ambarawa district government.