Within urban environments, electric bicycles need serious consideration. A scooter does not provide you the flexibility that an ebike does. Yes they are speed limited, however they are significantly cheaper.<p>My wife suffers from knee problems, so we're in the process of buying a pedal assist+throttle ebike to enable her to get around the city of Bath. A moped would not enable her to take advantage of the cycle paths in the area. She would still need to mix with HGVs on the road.<p>It naturally needed a basket and the right colour :)
<a href="http://www.juicybike.co.uk/electric-bikes/classic-click-dutch-style-electric-bicycle" rel="nofollow">http://www.juicybike.co.uk/electric-bikes/classic-click-dutc...</a><p>Electric bikes have benefited massively from technology advancements in the last couple of years and anyone looking at an electric scooter should seriously consider an electric bicycle. It offers a lot more flexibility in where you can go with it.
Electric scooters are becoming very popular here in Amsterdam, and I really hope this gets more of the gas-powered scooters off the market.<p>Scooters here are mostly either used by delivery boys or as a luxury item (since the bike lanes are so good). There is a decent amount of hostility towards scooters from bikers since (right now) they often share the same lanes; scooter riders are impatient, honk-y, often drive too fast and cause accidents, and blast those they are passing with smog. There's a movement to get them off the bike lanes and into traffic.<p>Scooters emit less CO2 per distance traveled than cars (and obviously much less than bike riders!) but often much more smog causing pollutants that affect air quality. Given that there is a really big push to improve air quality in European city centers, electric scooters can make a big difference. Plus gas-powered scooters are noisy as all hell, especially during peak food delivery hours (since all delivery boys love zooming around on their toys making as much noise as possible). I'm starting to see a lot of delivery companies switching to electric scooters, and I'm hoping that this trend either continues or that the government simply mandates these for commercial operations within the city.
Since the article didn't provide any pics of the bike : <a href="http://www.gogoro.com/" rel="nofollow">http://www.gogoro.com/</a><p>This article reads like a sales pitch, Everything about it sounds so right. By the end I was looking for the "invest now" button :D
I had a really interesting conversation with a couple of guys a few months ago about cost of living. Cost of living is a really interesting entry point into thinking about economics, policies, wealth and such. I really think our decisions would be better if this was a bigger part of the economic debate rather then the very abstract macroeconomics, political theory and abstract ideological debates we have been carrying for so long. The role of technology, policy and taste/choices is a lot easier to decipher. I think it's a lot more productive way of structuring public debate/demands/protests.<p>Cost of living at the fat centre of the distribution for many/most households in advanced economies looks something like like this:<p><pre><code> - Housing + utilities (25-50% of income)
- Transport (10-20%)
- Groceries (7.5-15%)
</code></pre>
Housing is the big hairy item. It's dishearteningly competitive, so high income places often have correspondingly high housing costs and the percentage remains constant.<p>Anyway.. Transport.<p>Transport is a major cost item and it's quality is important. A fundamental ingredient in most people and place's fundamental economic wellbeing equation. It's also one of the most fixable with technology.<p>A 90 minutes commute on crowded public transport is way worse than a 10 minute walk or drive. Transport infrastructure takes up a lot of space, affects air quality, makes noise, affects walkability and lots of other key quality of life issues. Energy. Time. Health. Money. Transport is a very big deal.<p>If you've seen cities that had major increases in cycling and/or electric bikes/scooters, you were probably surprised by the success. There is a lot of potential here.<p>10-20 mph electric bikes, given the right customs, rules and infrastructure can be awesome in dense urban areas. Potentially game-changing over time.
For the people not used to the imperial unit system:<p>125 cc is 125 cm³.
30 mph is around 50 km/h (the speed it reaches in 4.2 seconds).
60 mph is around 95 km/h (the max speed).
266 800 square-foot is 24 786 m².
20 miles are around 32 kilometers.
8900 square-foot is 826 m².
Gogoro has been making a lot of waves in Taiwan lately. A few Gogoro stores have been showing up in Taipei and they feel very much like Apple stores!<p>The prospect of seeing an iconic company born out of Taiwan is exciting!
A german competitor could be UNU Motors: <a href="https://unumotors.com/product" rel="nofollow">https://unumotors.com/product</a><p>They solve the battery swap problem by letting you bring your battery inside and charge it from normal wall outlets.
their battery system logo looks amazingly close to arduino:
<a href="http://www.gogoro.com/smartscooter/Easier" rel="nofollow">http://www.gogoro.com/smartscooter/Easier</a>
Electric scooters (not fancy design ones like this but rather pedestrian-looking ones) are already completely ubiquitous in China, both for deliveries (including for 20kg water jugs, it's a bit disconcerting seeing a moped with 4 or more of those on the back) and for a very unsafe short-distance unlicensed taxi service for the last mile from the metro stop.
> Riders won’t own the batteries. Instead, they’ll pay a low monthly fee to swap portable batteries as needed from a network of charging stations.<p>This is the key thing that electric cars need too - we need standardised batteries which can be swapped out, then the charging time is irrelevant.
The only reason anyone buys scooters, either electric or gas, in America is they can usually be operated without a license and insurance. Otherwise they make zero financial sense. They are <i>more</i> expensive than 250cc gasoline motorcycles that require very little maintenance, sip gasoline, and can go 65+ mph.<p>You can get a perfectly good small motorcycle for $2k. Dropping some multiple of that for an electric scooter toy makes no sense.