Floor space is at a premium in cities — everyone wants to walk, bike, drive, and park their various human- and gas-powered vehicles on the same precious real estate. Vertical space, on the other hand, is available in abundance. And while the obvious use for this space is crazy-ass trompe l'oeil murals, the second-best option is doing something useful and innovative to take some of the space burden off the ground. Voila: The bike hanger.
These aren't reality, yet, but the concept is brilliant. These vertical bike racks work something like a Ferris wheel or the motorized rack at a dry cleaner's — you hook up your bike and then hoist it out of reach, and bring it back around when you want to take it down. Bikes are stored safely (it's really hard to steal a bike that's hanging three stories in the air), fallow between-building wall space is put to good use, and you can store up to 36 bikes in a footprint similar to a standard bike rack. Plus, the rack can be built with a canopy to keep rain off your seat. And in an extra bit of design delightfulness, the mechanism that turns the rack is in the form of a stationary bike — you pedal it until your ride comes into reach.
