Infrastructure

Swapping batteries in ebikes is pretty common, but things get more complicated for electric cars. EV maker Nio has had swappable batteries at the heart of its design language for a while now, and has recently celebrated its 500,000th battery swap.

It looks like it was designed for the zombie-apocalypse, but the TF-19 Wasp from Ohio-based Throwflame is a serious piece of kit with potentially life-saving applications. From clearing critical infrastructure to pest management and forest fire back-burns, this modern-day dragon is nobody's toy.

UAVs could be useful for monitoring railroads or gas pipes if they weren’t limited by battery life. Now SkyX has installed its first xStation, a recharging dock that can be placed periodically along a route to extend the range of its drones almost indefinitely.

​Intel thinks it could use drones to make infrastructure a little safer. Intel CEO Brian Krzanich​ presented the company's vision for how its commercial drones can perform bridge inspections and close mapping that have previously required putting human inspectors in some precarious positions.

Norway's most hazardous shipping route passes around the Stad peninsula but an ambitious plan aims to build the world's first ship tunnel directly through the peninsula, enabling ships to travel in safety. We interviewed Stad Ship Tunnel Project Manager Terje Andreassen about the project.

London, UK, with its proposed Thames Deckway, isn't the only city with designs on a floating cycle path along its arterial river. If waterfront restoration firm Second Shore has its way, 28 neighborhoods in Chicago will be connected by a floating cycle path that is both covered and solar powered.

As cities look for ways to source renewable energy, cleanly charge electric vehicles and provide fast, ubiquitous communication networks, New York-based startup Totem has developed something called the Totem to deliver all three. What's more, it looks pretty good too.

Startup Addibots is looking to help cut the man hours required to maintain our cities, wheeling out a roving 3D printing robot it imagines will scoot around town mending dodgy road surfaces.

Last year, we reported on the Thames Deckway: a very ambitious billion dollar proposal to build a floating, sustainably-powered cycle path on the River Thames, in the heart of London. In a bid to raise funds to move the project forward, an Indiegogo crowdfunding campaign has been launched.

The street lighting in the US city of Los Angeles is about to get smarter. LA is to become the first city in the world to deploy Philips' SmartPole street lights, which are equipped with fully integrated 4G LTE wireless telecommunications technology. A total of 100 SmartPoles will be rolled out.

Foster + Partners has drawn upon its considerable experience designing airports to propose a "Droneport" for the East African country of Rwanda. The project will see drones fly out from the hub and travel up to 100 km to take medical and other urgent supplies to where they're needed.

NBBJ has unveiled a new proposal to replace tube trains in the London Underground's Circle Line with travelators, or moving walkways. The firm says this would allow users to stroll relatively long distances more quickly than if traveling by train.