

Electric scooter design that makes a hole lot of sense - pointillistic
http://www.bbc.com/future/story/20130714-hole-new-design-for-scooters

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bazzargh
An electric-assist bakfiets (dutch-style cargo bike) costs around €1600 - way
less than this thing; and it works when out of juice. The scooter is probably
a bit faster, but with the speed of city traffic and 30km/h / 20mph zones
popping up all over, I don't see much of an advantage there.

Of course, the market has room for many variations on a theme. But it also
makes me wonder if the motivation for variation sometimes isn't like the
design of the Strida
([https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Strida](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Strida)).
According to an interview Mark Sanders (the designer) gave on TV in the 80s,
that was originally designed with an X frame and looked more like a normal
bike, but then they did a patent search and discovered a folding bike with
that design in Asia. So Mark redesigned it to the A frame you see today not
because it was better from an engineering/design standpoint, but to make a
protectable design. I'd be surprised if this company didn't have a sheaf of
patents in its pocket.

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fuzzythinker
Note that the article is dated 2013. The company
[http://litmotors.com](http://litmotors.com) has now pivoted (don't see that
scooter anywhere on its website) to a bigger personal vehicle.

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JoeAltmaier
How about: a regular scooter with a small one-wheel trailer?

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howlingfantods
I live in China. An electric scooter here is 500 USD, and that's the nice
model that expatriates buy.

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Roboprog
Comparison by "price point", gotta love it. "This costs about the same as
other $5000 scooters!"

Sounds a bit high to market in India to me.

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tonypace
This looks like it would be insanely difficult to park. Plus, there's nowhere
to put your feet, though that's easily remedied.

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Aardwolf
Nice for loads, but I don't see how you could sit with multiple people on it.

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OneOneOneOne
Good point. In Vietnam I witnessed a family of four riding a single scooter.
Baby brother was standing on the seat between mom and big sister!

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Roboprog
Seeing that kind of thing in downtown Hyderabad made me want to cry.

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lozf
Article dated 15 July 2013

