The "Solar Mobility" GUI, And How It Works (From the front desk of SmartVan Paratransit)

The purpose for integrating a GUI into paratransit:

With an innovative web portal that allows users to "dial-a-ride" in realtime, Uber has certainly created one of the world's very first, automated paratransit systems. But in the form of more specialized networks like Access Paratransit, there really is no such thing.

Truth be told, Access and the like are geared toward the physically-challenged, and we need a live interface for our transportation more than anybody. But as it currently stands, our paratransit network in Los Angeles, much like our bus and rail corridors, are insufficient, and in the eyes of our organization's wellness model, this is namely due to a lack of automation technology in the public sector.

But we also have to face the truth: even though automation technology benefits everyone across the board, it translates in a very special and delicate way to the physically-challenged community. Within the vast, geographical context of a city like Los Angeles, it becomes true all the more.

What the Mobility GUI does:

1. Set up rider accounts and profiles

2. Make reservations/payments

3. Send trip profiles to the office/vehicle via GPS

4. Allows users to see available rides/vehicles

5. Vehicle/trip tracking capabilities

6. Price list viewing capabilities

7. Direct video chat with drivers/staff

8. GUI based on “Uber” platform

9. Projected cost: $120-600K

10. Construction timeframe: 2-5 years

Permobil C-300 Performance Stats

Our mission, for the purposes of establishing performance brackets on our Permobil C-300 power chair, was to run the vehicle under substantial, off-road environments. In this case, our playground of choice was none other than the San Fernando Valley's own, Balboa Lake.

So we were more interested in achieving sustainable distance than we were in grabbing on to any kind of outright performance, but what we did find made sense and was mind-boggling, all at the same time. It appears that when one pilot tries to grab on to all three of the power chair's performance variables simultaneously, the chair's running gear simply won't allow for that synchrocity. Maybe because of accessory drag, or maybe the vehicle has some kind of rev limiter.

Whatever the case, we know that if what is true of the C-300 platform is true across the board, then most power chairs currently available simply can not sustain the variables needed to meet most environmental demands. Apparently, the adaptive market has been one of our nation's smallest, even after the dawn of our very own, civil rights bill.

The Sustainability Of Powered Wheelchairs: Yet Another Argument Toward Autonomous Transportation

What the disabled community has discovered over the years is that power chairs are much more than medical equipment; they function, both figuratively and literally, as sustainable transportation. The formula that our committee has found, in terms of overall running dynamics on power chair platforms, is one that says that the workload has to be underneath the chair's actual running speed, but that the running speed can never exceed the actual workload, or wattage.

This is mostly because with Permobil's front-to-mid drive as our test layout, we found a substantial amount of rear tipper vibration, in environments where the top speed matched the vehicle's actual watt output, or workload.

That language can be further translated to the bus, rail and paratransit networks. With conventional buses and vans, you always have human error, but if that same bus or van was fully-autonomous, then you would have no human vision or judgement at all.

The ideal solution is to have both, so by building a paratransit system that's both capable of being autonomous and driven, you can have real human judgement, but without the error component attached. 

The "Binaural Motor Theory," And How That Theory Applies To Paratransit

To create any kind of transport system or hub, based on this whole notion of DC motor automation and web-connectivity, seems too fantastic to even be physically-possible. But in the world of 2015, where technology is becoming so mobile at such a fast rate, vehicle automation is seriously becoming an element, a "thing" that we all need to start thinking about.

It's not just kinesiology or overall theory, and if you take that notion and translate it to the physically-challenged community, what you get is a solid formula for the most sustainable transport system possible. The formula is one that establishes a direct correlation between workload and running speed, and this is how it breaks-down: Automated vehicle + accessibility=SmartVan.

But even a formula as tacky as that has fibers that make-up its very construction, and those fibers were ones that had to be collected out in the field, using the power chair itself as a test vehicle. What a series of test runs at the San Fernando Valley's Balboa Lake revealed is that whether going uphill or down, most electric-powered wheelchairs, in order to be sustainable and perform, must be able to calibrate all vehicle variables in relation to terrain.

This is true of an all-electric platform like a power chair or even a Tesla Model S, so why wouldn't it be true for a more passenger and cargo-oriented platform, such as the "Unicab?" It does, in fact become evident that the vehicle is irrelevant; it's the intuitive platform that becomes the kernel of our many science experiments.

In the '80s, it was at least somewhat true for the world of GM muscle, that the G-Bodied Buick Regal also served as a testing ground for more progressive ways of building sustainable performance. That language, in and of itself, could care less whether or not that turbocharged Regal appears in the guise of a Grand National or an even less-rated T-Type; the point is the turbo V-6 concept.

So over time, what a lot of us start to understand is that it's kind of hard to differentiate between vehicle and platform, but once we start to understand what's going on, we can take the language of the formula and translate it.

In an environment where the variable, "WL" represents workload, or watts, the amount of workload must be directly proportional to the amount of running speed produced by a platform's running gear, or RPM. So when you take that principle or molecule and apply it to a powered wheelchair, it fits geometrically. The reason that it does is because under the confines of that very formula, nearly any power chair platform can run optimally on top of nearly any terrain type. So by using that analogy, the "binaural-motor" or sustainable transport theory actually boils-down as follows: Min RPM/Max WL=Tr, or "transport." This very formula, when translated to the automotive sector, also fits geometrically.