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Portland's TriMet ushers in mobile ticketing for smartphones
Not all of Portland, Oregon is dreaming of the '90s. As proof of that, the region's transit system, TriMet, is taking a step into the future by launching the beta test of an electronic ticketing system that lets riders purchase fares from their smartphones. The ambitious effort extends to all of TriMet's major operations, which includes city busses, the MAX light rail, the WES commuter rail and the Portland Streetcar. As it stands, 150 participants will take part in the beta trial before the program opens to all riders later this summer. The push toward modernization is made possible by a Portland-based company, GlobeSherpa, which has developed a payment system and ticket validation app that also allows for fleet optimization and provides service alerts to riders. Currently, the TriMet app is available for Android and iOS, but GlobeSherpa tells us that it'll deliver future versions for BlackBerry and Windows Phone. Hit up the break for a peek at what's in store for The City of Roses.
AT&T's LTE network now live in Seattle, Portland, Pittsburgh and Honolulu
The Rethink Possible carrier may be taking baby steps towards its LTE goals, but today more folks will be happy that they, too, can finally start experiencing some speedier service. AT&T has announced its adding a few more names to its LTE-ready list of cities, including Seattle, Portland, Pittsburgh and Hawaii's beautiful capital, Honolulu. Additionally, users in the "metro" area of Detroit should now also be able to connect to the fresh Long Term Evolution network, while Memphis and Birmingham saw their names added to the listings early on yesterday. More importantly, though, how's it working out for you (if at all)? Please let us know in the comments below.
The Engadget Show 35: EVs in Portland, hacked bicycles and a Tesla Model S test drive
With a transportation themed episode, it only seemed natural to take the Engadget Show out of our traditional digs -- it was also a great excuse to visit one of our favorite cities in the world: Portland, Oregon. We drove Mitsubishi's i-MiEV EV around the Northwestern green mecca, stopping at some great PDX spots along the way, including the amazing Ground Kontrol arcade, Hand-Eye Supply and the hackerspace, Brain Silo. We also took the time to speak to some PDX residents, including Core77 co-founder Eric Ludlum and some local modders showing off their homebrew projects. Also, Brian travels out to Boston to ride along with a gang of bike hackers, Myriam takes the Tesla Model S for a spin around the streets of San Francisco and Michael does his best not to fall off the DTV Shredder in the California desert. And, as always, we got a pile of the month's latest and greatest gadgets, including the Google Nexus 7, Hasbro's new Lazer Tag guns and a quick trip around OS X Mountain Lion. Also: comic books, donuts and plenty of EV road trip shenanigans. Click through the break to tune in!
All-weather motorcycle helmet heats and cools your face, protects grey matter (video)
Bob Averill, who introduced us to the world of underwater hamster care, had a couple of other projects to show us during our visit to Portland, Oregon, including the All-Weather Motorcycle Helmet. What, you ask, makes a motorcycle helmet "all-weather?" Why, built-in heating and cooling, of course. Averill started with a standard Vega modular helmet, adding an evaporative cooler powered by a solar panel on top. The cooler pulls air from an intake on the helmet's side, sucking up more air at higher speeds and blowing it through a sponge, across the wearer's face. When things get too cold, there's a heater built into the liner, created from a heated mouse pad and powered by a lithium battery. Averill is looking to get the project mass-produced, but that's easier said than done, when it comes to a safety products like this -- and Kickstarter, apparently, isn't playing ball. Check out a video of the helmet after the break.
Alpha Range iOS game requires a pico projector and laser pointer, we go hands-on (video)
Granted, a magical little smartphone is all the gadgetry most casual gaming fans require to get their fix, but when LaserVR's Travis Haagen popped by our informal meetup at Portland's Ground Kontrol to talk about Alpha Range, we couldn't help but be impressed by the project. The game has a classic Asteroids / Space Invaders feeling to it, but Alpha Range is more than just another bit of mobile nostalgia. For one thing, you're going to need a lot more than just your phone, including a projector (pico will do fine for your needs) and a tripod. You project the game field onto a the wall (in the case of Ground Kontrol, we taped up a few pieces of paper, which worked fine) and interact with objects using a laser point. When your iOS device is facing the wall, its camera monitors the field, using computer vision algorithms to detect your laser shots in real time, finally discovering a novel use for laser points that doesn't involve annoying rock bands or cats. Hitting the circular enemies will cause them to vaporize or perform other functions like opening up a black hole, depending on their color. The game was pretty responsive and incredibly addictive -- in fact, we were a bit bummed when we finally had to put the laser point down. Such fun isn't cheap, however -- it'll run you $8 from iTunes, on top of the price of all the accessories involved it getting it off the ground. Still, it's nice to see an innovative take like this on a classic gaming scenario. We've got a video of the Star Trek: The Next Generation-inspired game after the jump.
How 3D printing changed the face of 'ParaNorman'
We drive around in circles trying to find the place. There's no signage indicating our destination -- no giant, looming cartoon characters or even a logo, just a faceless building in a maze of industrial parks, about 17 miles outside of Portland. It's a beautiful drive of course, sandwiched on a vaguely winding highway by dense Pacific Northwest foliage, past Nike's global headquarters. Compared to the world-class tracks and fields dotting the shoemaker's campus, Laika's own offices are an exercise in modesty (in spite of financial ties to Phil Knight), virtually indistinguishable from the densely packed businesses that surround it. There are, perhaps, certain advantages to such anonymity -- for one thing, it helps the studio avoid random drop-ins by movie fans hoping to chew the ear off of their animation heroes. It also means that our cab driver does a good three passes before finally getting out of the car and asking a smoker standing outside a nearby building where to go. He thinks about it for a moment and indicates a building -- a large, but otherwise indistinguishable space. The lobby doesn't scream Hollywood either, but it certainly offers some less-than-subtle hints that we've found the place: a wall-sized black and white image of classic film cameras (ancient devices, someone tells me, that were utilized on the company's previous film), and in one corner, a tiny room encased in glass, with Coraline seated at a table in its center. This building is the house that she built -- or at least kept the lights on; "Coraline" was released after its planned successor "Jack & Ben's Animated Adventure" failed to materialize. Inside, the cavernous space in excess of 150,000 square feet has become a bustling small town of creatives, laboring away in its recesses, many having traveled through several time zones to be in its rank, like carnies hopping from town to town. Stop-motion animation, after all, isn't the most prevalent of professions, and while we've arguably entered a sort of golden age for the infamously labor-intensive art form, thanks in large part to the success of projects like "Coraline," the number of studios actually investing in the form can be counted on one hand.%Gallery-162720%
Come hang with us at Ground Kontrol in Portland, OR, this Wednesday
Live in Portland, Oregon? Read Engadget? Love classic arcade games? If you answered "yes" to all three of those, we've got some great news. We'll be in Stumptown this week and figured it might be fun to have an impromptu meetup at one of our favorite locales in the Rose City. If you haven't been (and shame on you if you haven't, Portlandians), Ground Kontrol is an insanely awesome classic arcade / bar, located right next to PDX's Chinatown (not to mention a few blocks from places like Floating World Comics and Voodoo Doughnut) at 511 NW Couch St. Swing by a little before 1PM, and we'll be letting people in first come, first serve (capacity is limited) -- and best of all, since it's too early to open the bar itself, it'll be an all-ages function. We'll be hanging out, shooting some video and playing with old video games and new gadgets. More information on the venue can be found in the source link below. [Image credit: Lincoln Barbour]
IBM and Portland team up to see into city's future
Is it possible to see into a city's future? Perhaps, if you're backed by a company like IBM. The computing giant has teamed up with Portland, Oregon for its Systems Dynamics for Smarter Cities program, creating a simulation of the city (a veritable "Sim City," as it were), so governmental leaders can see the ways in which public policies might affect its future. IBM approached the northwestern cultural mecca back in 2009, working with representatives from a number of professions, including teachers, economists, city planners, and business leaders in the interim. The information collected was combined with governmental data to create a computer-based model of the city. Among other things, city leaders have used the model to work out a plan to reduce the city's carbon emissions 80 percent by the year 2050. Add in a guide to those famous Portland food carts and we'll be 100 percent behind the project.
Verizon's next big LTE push coming July 21st
You can't stop Verizon's nationwide LTE push -- and even hoping to contain it seems like a bit much to ask these days. The company made its last major 4G service rollout just under a week ago, and now it's looking to do the same next month, adding a slew of new markets to its coverage umbrella and expanding in a few existing locales on July 21st. New markets include Portland, OR, Toledo, OH, Winston-Salem and Raleigh-Durham, NC, Maui, HI, Wichita, KS, and Knoxville, TN, to name a few. Coverage will be expanded in Seattle, Louisville, Phoenix, Los Angeles, San Diego, and Las Vegas. The full list of high-speed recipients can be found in the link below.
Xfinity Home Security makes home monitoring and management Comcastic (video)
It looks like Comcast's trial bubble has been something of a success, and now the company is announcing that its Xfinity Home Security Service will be branching out beyond Houston to arm alarms, dim lamps and keep home automation freaks appraised of sports scores in an additional six markets (including Philadelphia, Portland, Jacksonville, Sarasota/Naples, Chattanooga and Nashville). Powered by iControl Networks' Open Home automation and security platform, packages start at $40 a month and feature live video monitoring, lighting and climate control, burglar and fire alarm monitoring, and more -- via touchscreen interface, web portal, and iPhone app. Now you too can put your family's safety in the same hands that bring Gilligan's Island into your home! Video, PR-palooza after the break.
Google Offers rolling out in Portland, Oregon tomorrow, SF and NYC this summer
If you've been watching our liveblog of Eric Schmidt at D9, you'll know that the Floyd's Coffee ad above isn't just a mockup -- this evening, the Google chairman announced his company's Groupon-like Google Offers service will launch in Portland, Oregon tomorrow. We'll also see it in San Francisco and New York City this summer, delivering daily deals directly to our NFC-equipped Nexus S smartphones.
Zipcar adds the plug-in Prius PHEV to its fleet, probably not changing name to Zapcar
Would you like a plug-in Prius, the sort that we spent a few days with last year, back when the seasons were changing and there was only a hint of this killer winter to come? Well, too bad, because you still can't buy them. But Zipcar can, apparently, adding eight of the things to its fleet, and they're available now in Boston, San Francisco, and Portland, Oregon. Given the company has 8,000 total cars available your chances of securing one of these particular Priuses (Prii?) is slim, but if you score, know that they charge in just three hours on a 110 outlet, and half that if you're wired for 220, so no fancy-pants charging station is required for use.
Google rolls out NFC-equipped Places business kits, muscles in on location-based territory in Portland
Yelp may be the raconteur of restaurant recommendations and Foursquare the cardinal of check-ins, but Google has an ace up its sleeve: NFC chips. The company's embedded near-field communications chips into each and every one of these "Recommended on Google Places" window stickers, which you'll be able to trigger with a shiny new Nexus S -- just hold your handset up to the black dot, and voila, your phone gets a "tag." Google's now distributing the signs on a trial basis to Portland, Oregon businesses as part of a larger Google Places kit, though it doesn't explain how (or if) they'll be able to program the chips. Either way, if you own a hot new joint in Portland, you might as well give it a spin. Find the sign-up form at our more coverage link, or peep a Nexus S doing its thing after the break.
Thieves drive truck through Apple retailer's wall
We've heard of quite a few robberies at Apple Stores (and in its own twisted way, the idea makes sense -- despite the adage that 'crime doesn't pay,' laptops and iPhones are certainly easy to carry and very resellable), but this is probably the most brute force way we've seen it done. A set of thieves in Portland, Oregon just plain crashed a truck through the front window of the MacPac reseller there, and ripped off some iPads, MacBooks, and a few more devices from the store a few weeks ago. Fortunately, it sounds like things are as under control as they can be -- not only did the store's cameras capture the suspects on tape, but the police showed up within minutes, and the store's owner says that even though this has happened before, "the last person who did this we put away." So it sounds like justice will be served up, Apple retailer style, soon enough. Thanks, Patrick!
Court reaffirms: fourth amendment rights not violated if the police install a GPS device on your car when it's not in your garage
Back in January, a court in Portland, Oregon ruled that the Fourth Amendment rights of one Juan Pineda-Moreno had not been violated by the police when they tracked him using various GPS devices they installed on the underside of his Jeep with magnets. You see, the police suspected that Pineda-Moreno was growing Marijuana somewhere, and they really didn't like that. Eventually, Pineda-Moreno was arrested and convicted of crimes involving the growth of said Marijuana -- but he appealed the decision because he thought that his Fourth Amendment rights (the one which guards against unreasonable search and seizure) had been violated. The appeals court has recently upheld the original decision, but there were five dissenting votes, meaning that the case is anything but cut and dried. Now, what's obvious is that the police didn't have to traverse into "private" space to attach the tracking device to the suspect's car, but clearly it's debatable -- even as far as the judges are concerned -- what constitutes private and public space. The case is surely not going to end here, so we'll keep you updated. In the meantime, watch your back.
Mario Kart symbols appear on bike lanes in Portland, Ore.
Some wily vandal in Portland, Oregon has painted Mario Kart symbols into the pavement there on one of the city's bike lanes. You can see them in action in this video (also embedded after the break). Unfortunately, the bananas, star and speed arrows don't actually confer the same powers they do in the game, but we did smirk to see that all of the bikers do faithfully avoid the banana peel, and hit the rest of the symbols head on. You can even wring some unintentional hilarity from the dry-as-a-Dry Bones explanation of what each powerup does by the KATU anchor. That's right, Carl Click! You might have read that script just fine, but admit it: You don't know a Red Shell from a Blooper.
North America's first public-use quick-charge station opens in Portland: 3-handed politician not included
What's being hailed as North America's first public-use quick-charge station for electric vehicles has just been unveiled in Portland. The station, built by NEC subsidiary Takasago, is installed in a PGE headquarters parking garage and will charge electric vehicles with lithium-ion batteries to 80% in about 20 to 30 minutes. So yeah, it's public, as long as you've got a PGE badge apparently. Anyway, the grand opening was led by Governor Ted Kulongoski, pictured above carefully maintaining a safe distance while charging a Nissan Leaf. Guess you can never be too careful when pumping 50kW into a pre-production vehicle. Click through to see a video demonstration of the future, if we're lucky. Update: We're being told that the quick charge station is installed in a public parking garage that is part of the World Trade Center building in downtown Portland (where PGE's headquarters are). It costs $3 to park, but charging is on the house. Thanks, Chris!
Sprint now reselling WiMAX in Atlanta, Portland and Las Vegas
Atlanta, Portland and Las Vegas have been lit with Clearwire's CLEAR WiMAX for varying lengths of time now, but throw a Sprint label on there and you've got a whole new party to attend. In what's easily one of the stranger partner relationships in the business world today, Sprint has just announced that it's reselling 4G services in a trio of markets that have actually had the service for months / weeks / days now. So yeah, nothing really new here -- it's the same 4G waves that Clearwire customers have been enjoying for awhile, but if you're more comfortable waltzing into a carrier store, now's your chance. We'll leave you to the read links below for the specifics, but here's the long and short of it: if you've got a 4G-capable device, you can add WiMAX to your plan for an extra $10 per month on top of your 3G data plan.Read - Las VegasRead - PortlandRead - Atlanta
CLEAR WiMAX goes live in Las Vegas, Samsung Mondi ships to take advantage
Looking for one more excuse to stay inside and avoid that sweltering Las Vegas heat this summer? Good news, gamblers -- Clearwire's CLEAR WiMAX service has officially gone live across 638 square miles in the greater Las Vegas area. By the books, that's serving right around 1.7 million residents, not including the influx of tourists from other WiMAX-equipped cities that will undoubtedly take advantage. To coincide with the launch, Samsung has also announced that its QWERTY-packin', DivX-friendly Mondi -- which we toyed with back at CTIA -- will be available in Vegas-area Best Buy and Clearwire outlets starting August 1st. Said MID arrives with 4G support, WiFi, GPS, 3 megapixel camera, a QWERTY keypad, a 4.3-inch touchscreen, Opera 9.5 and a customizable set of widgets on top of Windows Mobile. The device is supposedly available now through Samsung's website and "select Samsung authorized distributors," but we're having no lucky hunting one down at present time.Read - CLEAR in Las VegasRead - Samsung Mondi shipping
Comcast launches High-Speed 2go WiMax service tomorrow in Portland, other cities to follow by end of year
Put down that bowl of homemade granola and take heed, citizens of Portland: you're about to get a first crack at Comcast's High-Speed 2go service, and we don't want any of your excuses about "taking a tech sabbatical" or "getting lost in the wilderness" to keep you away from sweet, sweet broadband bundles. Based on Clearwire's WiMAX service, Comcast High-Speed 2go is available in a "Fast Pack Metro" bundle which packs home internet service, a WiFi router and the WiMAX for $50 a month, with another $20 tacking on nationwide Sprint 3G (along with the appropriate 3G / WiMAX combo card). Existing Triple Play customers can add the WiMAX by itself for $30. Comcast plans to launch similar service in Atlanta, Chicago, and Philadelphia before the end of 2009.
