Seats for bollards as a design hack

Photo: Magdalena Wierzbicka & Miarka Webb.

NotionsCapital calls our attention to a "design hack" for security bollards, plastic seats that can be fitted onto the poles. According to Fast Company ("This ingenious hack turns anti-terror bollards into furniture"), they were created by:

Peruvian designer and architect Beatriz Pero Giannini. The three chairs–called the rocker, the slider, and the wobbler–sit atop bollards and function like seesaws. If one person sits down they’ll probably be uncomfortable, but if two people sit together it brings each design into balance. By encouraging people to sit down together, Giannini hopes to bolster a sense of community among strangers.

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FWIW, I do think that DC should install retractable bollards in various places so that streets can be closed to motor vehicle traffic, especially when it is done regularly, such as for farmers markets, without having to use ugly alternatives that are safer.  Or simple street closing methods which lack security.

For years, sitting on the Eastern Market Community Advisory Committee, I've argued for retractable bollards on 7th St. SE, because the measures used to block the street don't meet the safety protocols recommended to ward off attacks, and Eastern Market, given events elsewhere, is a primary soft target (but fortunately the street is perpendicular to major arterials, making it hard to build up speed).

This year, finally, the city is addressing the matter with a "bollard study."

Liverpool.


Farmers Market in Petworth using a section of 9th Street NW.

I saw automatic retractable bollards in Liverpool, but unfortunately I wasn't able to shoot a video of them in operation. This comic video makes clear that such systems are designed to only let one vehicle in at a time.