On a day in late February, a shed-like vehicle pulled up in front of a Bottega Veneta store on a high-end shopping street in Amsterdam and parked for the day. Inside the structure–exactly the size of one parking place–was a bike rack designed to bring extra infrastructure to an area where it’s difficult to find a place to lock a bicycle, even in bike-obsessed Amsterdam. “It ‘steals’ a car parking space, to allow parking for eight bicycles,” says Hugo Velthuis, manager of Union , a Dutch bike brand that worked with the creative agency Natwerk on the intervention. “[It’s] an innovative way to give bikes priority over cars.” [Photo: courtesy Natwerk] The pop-up bike shed, with tiny wheels, is equipped with a license plate so it can legally use a parking space even though it isn’t a typical vehicle. “We found a little loophole to fix that,” says Velthius. “Sometimes you must be a bit creative to make things work. Especially when it is for a cause you really believe in.” The team then fed the parking meter, which costs €4 (about $4.50) an hour in the area. The intervention is a clear illustration of how the space that […]
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