Park benches around Boston will tap into the power of the sun to serve as charging stations for mobile devices as well as environmental monitors.
Changing Environment, an offshoot of MIT's Media Lab, is partnering with the city of Boston to begin setting up the benches around the city during the week of July 6 through 12.
The "Soofas," as they've been called, will use solar cells to power up to two mobile devices at one time and will make use of Verizon's 4G LTE network to pass along environmental data, such as air quality and noise levels. The information the Soofas collect will available to the public online.
The Mayor's Office of New Urban Mechanics collaborated with the MIT Media Lab and the Rose Kennedy Greenway to push the pilot of the first Soofa, back in 2013 -- and Boston Mayor Marty Walsh has shown his enthusiasm for the smart benches ever since.
"Your cell phone doesn't just make phone calls, why should our benches just be seats?" said Walsh. "We are fortunate to have talented entrepreneurs and makers in Boston thinking creatively about sustainability and the next generation of amenities for our residents."
Sandra Richter, one of the three founders and inventors of the Soofa, stressed the importance of staying connected in urban environments. Richter said she hoped the Soofa would push the advance of cities for her generation as well encourage females to get more involved with the development of technology.
"Soofa is the first step into Smart Urban Furniture -- the possibilities to update the city for the mobile generation are endless and long overdue," said Richter. "So are more female-led startups, which is why we hope to be a role model for women all over the world to found cool companies like Nan Zhao, Jutta Friedrichs and I did."
The city of Boston planned to install the benches at Titus Sparrow Park, the Rose Kennedy Greenway and the Boston Commons. The city of Boston has asked its citizens to vote on the location of an additional Soofa and has invited residents to propose names for the smart benches.
The first round of Soofas, which were said to wear a price tag of $3,000 a bench, were funded by Cisco Systems. So far, 10 Soofas have been installed around Boston and are live.
"What's really important to us is we're three women in hardware, which is actually pretty rare," said Richter. "We want to show girls that they can make sh*t happen, and that they can build companies. Being in the maker community is really important to us."
