Did you know you could be arrested for driving under the influence (DUI) or driving while intoxicated (DWI) on any type of vehicle including all types of transportation from golf carts to bicycles? The police have stopped their fair share of drunk golf cart riders, and now a bike shop in Japan is trying to prevent drunk biking.
Koowho, a specialty bike shop in Japan, is trying to cut down on drunk biking by developing the Alcoho-Lock. It’s a bike lock that attaches to your bicycle and requires that you blow the legal limit before it will unlock. It gets even smarter—because it is connected to your smartphone, your Alcoho-lock will actually contact your friends or family for you, just in case someone wants to come and pick up your bike because you’re too drunk to ride it.
Being drunk and riding a bicycle might not sound like that big of a deal, but the implications of a crash could mean life or death for the bike rider. Imagine if you blew through a stop sign on your bike because you were too drunk to notice one was there. Or if you drove straight into traffic? Not only could you kill yourself, but you could cause a crash that will kill others too.
With a battery life of 40 breathalyzer tests before you have to recharge it, the Alcoho-lock has the potential to be a great two-in-one device to stop you from drunk driving on your bike and keep your bike safe when you’re not riding it. A lot of people are commuters and this may be what they need to stop them from making the decision to get on their bike and trying to ride home, and having to submit to a breath test to ride their bike may even make them think twice about getting behind the wheel of their car and driving home after drinking.
Image from Alcoho-lock.
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