Transport Systems Catapult Vision ( and the Internet of Stuff )

In case you didn't know transportation Systems catapult vision is setting up in Milton Keynes and looking for collaborators.  I was watching http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-MtlqZsEx0I&feature=youtu.be

And a few of things have occurred to me from a research perspective. 

• I’ve been reading a PhD thesis on cycling in Newcastle. And the thing that truly still offends me is that there is no good transportation model or modelling tool for cycling. On the one hand I feel confident that my experience from developing modelling tools for pedestrians I could produce something that would work for cyclists. The downside is that this is really transportation research and way outside the remit of HCI. That said my current research arc is looking at interaction and navigation in buildings so there is some leeway. 
• As I mentioned to you I could create a nice box for counting cyclists. I think a real-time picture of cycling in a city could be quite interesting. 
• I like the idea of taking a lean start-up approach to encouraging cycling in the city.
• From a more computer  point of view and with the transportation hub strongly in mind I would think that people like MatterNEt ( http://matternet.us )  would be a big concern for the transportation hub people. Check the TED talk.  http://matternet.us/ted/  Amazon have also reported delivering items via drones. http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-25180906 currently this is illegal in the US/UK which is why the matter let people are looking at the Third World as a prototyping area. Clearly there is some interesting research looking at what would happen if  a change in the law was made.
• I think there is a very interesting PHD looking at modelling drone deliveries ( drone logistics).  Four example
• If we had deliveries via this kind of drone air force how many machines are we considering having in the air?
• What kind of delivery system would we have to have to match up with what we get at the moment by courier services?
• I am sure that lot of people would like to know about the costing of such a system. 
• Would having drones delivering goods to your back garden or office be cheaper than delivering them by courier?
• This would be quite a complex question involving needing the modelling of multiple autonomous agents.
• Four example, it is cheaper to ship by rail but the flexibility for trucks to move more on demand makes shipping by road a preferred option. 
• It would also be interesting to look at the energy consumption of these kinds of devices.
• Four example many people have suggested that it would be impossible for the UK to switch to a largely electric transportation economy. The current vision is that petrol will still be largely the only viable transportation source.
• The drones are still mostly electric would this mean that shipping lots of goods via drones would reduce our overall energy dependencies?
• Finally and I think Santi probably has this wrapped up already, but do the transportation modelling people have a good visualisation tool to look at these new transport models they are making?
• There definitely seems some possibility there for research.