The client
Transport for Greater Manchester
The brief
Transport for Greater Manchester (TfGM) had been successful in bidding for money from the Department for Transport (DfT) to help promote and develop cycling as an alternative form of commuting.
As part of the proposals they agreed to build a number of secure cycle storage facilities across Greater Manchester to make cycling a more attractive form of commuting giving people the peace of mind that their bikes were left in a secure facility while at work.
To develop a brand identity for the facilities that would fit in with the Better by Cycle and TfGM brand identities. There would be two types of facility, district storage facilities and regional storage facilities.
The district storage facilities would be smaller facilities that would house upto 50 bikes in a secure, key card operated building covered by CCTV. These types of facility would be built at Transport Interchanges including Bury, Ashton-under-Lyne, Sale and Altrincham.
The regional storage facilities would be lager facilities with 100+ spaces located in Piccadilly, MediaCityUK and Spinningfields. These hubs would have facilities including showers, full length lockers, changing rooms, training facilities and retail outlets.
The concept
We firstly developed the concept of naming the facilities and after discussions settled on the name - Cycle Hubs - the reasoning behind this was that a Hub is the centre of a bike wheel and an integral part of a bike, Hub also has links with transport (A transport hub is a place where passengers and cargo are exchanged between vehicles or between transport modes).
We wanted to keep the look and feel of the Hubs simple to reflect the simplicity of the mode itself. A single colour was chosen from the core TfGM colour palette, simple pictograms were used to denote the facilities at each Hub. these would be used in signage and on promotional material.
Bury Interchange Cycle Hub
Above: Bury Interchange Cycle Hub
Above: Bury Interchange Cycle Hub. Images courtesy of Broxap Ltd
City Tower Cycle Hub
Window manifestations developed by Ben Coleman
Accent pillar in Cycle Hub blue
Bold door graphics in the Cycle Hub blue
