The Science Court and the high wire bicycle
Zimmer Gunsul Frasca Partnership · 1998
You enter the Science Center under a great glass dome held up by a lattice of curved steel ribs, and if you look up you will see a bicycle riding on a wire high above your head. The Science Court is the hub of the building: the ticket desks for IMAX and special exhibitions are here, the galleries open off it, and the hanging sculptures and lights change with the seasons. The photograph shows the dome from inside, with its ribs sweeping up toward an oculus, and the strings of lights that hang from it for much of the year.
The bicycle is the first exhibit most visitors try. A rider pedals along a cable stretched across the court, thirteen metres up, and cannot fall because a heavy weight hangs beneath the bicycle on a rigid bar, putting the centre of gravity far below the wire. Push the bicycle to one side and it swings back upright like a pendulum. It is a lesson in balance and centre of mass that most people remember for the rest of their lives, and there is usually a queue of children and nervous adults waiting to take their turn.
The dome was part of the rebuilding of the old Museum of Science and Industry that opened in 1998 and gave the Science Center its present form. The architects placed it at the head of the park's central axis, facing the rose garden, so that the museum's entrance is a glass lantern at the end of a long formal avenue. The court is free, cool and busy, and it is a good place to meet, to plan your route through the galleries, and to look down at the crowds from the upper level bridge before you set off.
Did You Know? The high wire bicycle works because a weight hanging beneath it keeps the centre of gravity below the cable, so the rider tips back upright no matter how hard they lean.
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