Surf Coast Shire Council is proud to partner with See.Sense, iMOVE and the TAC on a smart bike light technology ‘See.Sense Insights'.
Participating cyclists will use the See.Sense lights to collect real-time local data, which will help Council make cycling safer and more accessible across the shire.
We are looking for 200 cyclists to attach these smart lights to their bikes and continue riding on their normal routes. The data collected from the lights will provide valuable information to prepare funding applications for infrastructure upgrades, making cycling safer throughout the Shire.
The EOI period will be open from Monday 8 December 2025 to Friday 9 January 2026.
If you are a regular rider and want to be part of this project, submit your application below.
From late 2023 to 2025 Surf Coast Shire Council partnered with See.Sense and TAC on a smart bike light technology trial that provided 50 smart bicycle lights to cyclists within the Surf Coast area. The focus for this round of lights was the roads in and around Torquay.
Data collected from these lights has provided real time data which has helped to understand cyclists experiences across local roads, paths and infrastructure. This information has been used to prepare funding applications for cyclists infrastructure upgrades.
The previous project undertaken in 2023 to 2025, looked at seven high use, local cycling routes in Torquay township as identified through participants riding patterns.
A report was developed with detailed recommendations for practical, short to medium term treatments that Council could implement on each route in response to the data.
Seven projects to implement the recommendation of this report have been funded and with two projects completed.
A new project has been funded for an additional 200 lights for cyclists who ride in all areas of the Surf Coast Shire road network.
This stage will extend the project to include data on cyclist riding and safety patterns throughout the Shire and include a range of cyclists with different confidence levels and movement patterns, including parents accompanying children to school, commuter cyclists, cyclists riding for fitness and training cyclists.
The See Sense Insights Trial invites 200 Surf Coast Shire cyclists to participate over 12 months. Each participant will receive one See.Sense ICON3 smart bike light.
When participating cyclists are riding locally, the light will collect data that will provide valuable insights to a research team.
The technology allows cyclists to share:
- cyclist crash events, including mapping collision and close pass hotspots,
- abrupt accelerations or decelerations,
- swerving,
- road surface roughness,
- average and instantaneous speeds,
- dwell time,
- origin-destination and key routes/gateways, and,
- cyclist feedback.
The data will be aggregated to look at the combined data and not individual ride data.
Participants can set privacy zones, eg. around their home, so that no data is recorded in this zone.
All the data collected will be used to understand how cyclists use the Surf Coast network, and to prioritise and inform future investments into cyclist safety and connection projects.
Previous participants have said:
"I feel unsafe when riding around roundabouts. Have to look back, look forward and can get a bit wobbly. Its important to have projects like this that keep cyclists safe"
"Feel unsafe when on the road with cars. having infrastructure that separates us is really good and makes me feel a lot safer."
"I feel much safer riding on Fischer Street now. The visual, the separation, the cars get to see the green separation between cyclists and the road, and the speeds are much better."
Council has a number of upcoming cyclist-related projects on our road network, which will use the data collected through this trial.
Projects include:
Cycling safety improvements at:
- The Esplanade and Bell Street, Torquay
- Fischer Street, Torquay:
- Construction of dutch style roundabouts, similar to Inshore Drive, are currently under construction at Darian Road, Centreside Drive and Merrijig Drive roundabouts.
- Off road pathway raised road crossings.
Other safe cycling projects that have been submitted to federal and state government seeking cycling investment include:
- Bristol Road, Torquay, creation of safer cycling connection infrastructure.
- Noble Street, Anglesea, pathway extension and safer speeds project.
Further projects currently under development and will be submitted for future funding opportunities as they arise include:
- Safer active transport access through Torquay town centre.
- Safer active transport access through Lorne town centre -analyses project
- Torquay to Geelong cycling link - concept plans are currently being finalised. For more information about this project go to surfcoast.vic.gov.au/SafeCyclingTorquayGeelong
What happens next?
The EOI period is open until Friday 9 January 2026. All EOI submissions will be assessed and successful applications will be notified by the middle of February.
