CompleteCar

LA Design Challenge 2017: Launch Forth

All-inclusive games served by mass transit systems is the focus of Launch Forth.
Matt Robinson
Matt Robinson
@MttRbnsn

Published on December 21, 2017

The noble future vision of this conglomerate of major companies sees a global sporting event in 2060 that no longer differentiates between the Olympics and the Paralympics; everyone competes together. And Usain Bolt might want to look away, because to make the 2060 World Athletic Games more inclusive and exciting for the competitors, all world records are going to be reset ahead of the event.

To be fair, a lot of this vision focuses on how honourable the games are going to be in terms of the people competing in them, with only a brief mention of the public transport solutions required to serve this futuristic jamboree - and the solutions cited are 'mass transit, on-demand nanopods and individual hyperloop transport', which are all just varieties of train.

Further, the Launch Forth group makes noises about 'Mobility Zones' in LA eradicating congestion entirely, although we don't get to see how these systems might work, while autonomous bicycles and moving sidewalks (yes, like those 'flat' escalators you get in really big airport terminal buildings nowadays) ensure that people of all abilities can get to every event being held.

Launch Forth has a website for its efforts and describes itself as a global collective, focused on 'designing a new type of mobility device that provides an unprecedented degree of agility and function to users participating in multiple sports'. The team was comprised of Allen Griffy, Austin Baker, Elle Shelley and Katharina Wiehrdt.

Launch Forth video