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Someone in Liverpool came up with the brilliant idea of equipping motorcycles with firefighting equipment.
Liverpool is the first city in the UK to roll out two of the £30,000 bikes, which have pumps with a range of 11 metres, in a six-month pilot scheme. With 50 litres of water and chemical foam on board each specially modified BMW bike, they are capable as a pair of putting out two burning cars in two minutes.
The man in charge of the project added: “We have no intention of using them to replace fire engines. “Our two biggest work streams are automated fire alarms and anti-social small fires, which is what they will be used for.”
It appears to be a very clever idea. The bikes can navigate through traffic more quickly than full-size equipment, at lower cost and using less manpower.
Link. Photo: Peter Byrne/PA Wire.
Do you remember the the head-crushing sketch from The Kids in the Hall? Artist Chris O’Shea created something like it, but on a grand scale, in this augmented reality demonstration. As the people of Liverpool walk along the city streets, they are projected onto a huge LED screen. A giant hand appears on the screen and torments or picks up their images.
In 2007, British artist Richard Wilson created one of the most amazing public art ever, using a building in the Liverpool city center:
The most daring piece of public art ever commissioned in the UK, Turning the Place Over is artist Richard Wilson’s most radical intervention into architecture to date, turning a building in Liverpool’s city centre literally inside out. [...]
Turning the Place Over consists of an 8 metres diameter ovoid cut from the facade of a building in Liverpool city centre and made to oscillate in three dimensions. The revolving façade rests on a specially designed giant rotator, usually used in the shipping and nuclear industries, and acts as a huge opening and closing ‘window’, offering recurrent glimpses of the interior during its constant cycle during daylight hours.
Find out more about Turning the Place Over here: Link
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French Performance Art outfit La Machine unveiled this 3 million dollar steampunk spider, La Princesse, as part of the City of Liverpool’s year as European Capital of Culture.
Over a four day period, La Princesse – in search of a nest – climbed walls, stalked the streets and sprayed unwary citizens. This huge construction (here seen in some wonderful pictures) was deemed a huge success – but possibly not by any resident arachnaphobes.
This is in fact a massive thirty six tonne hydraulic spider scaling the side of a city block in Liverpool, England. The city is of course best known for The Beatles. However, during its time as the European City of Culture visitors to one of its main railway stations, Lime Street, could have been forgiven for thinking that the city had been invaded by a different type of insect altogether.
Link – via webphemera
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