Electric-Powered/Assisted Human Transportation — 16 Options
April 22, 202630 minutes ago
Arthur Frederick (Fritz) Hasler
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Everyone is familiar with electric cars, as these days the streets are swarming with electric Teslas, Rivians, Fords, Chevys, etc. However, there is now an electric powered/assisted transportation revolution going on at a smaller, usually personal, scale.
Keep in mind that these solutions will almost always eliminate a larger, less efficient, and often gas-powered vehicle. Of these, ebikes (electric bikes) are the most common and most useful. However, on the 14-mile-long Murdock bike trail that traverses my back property line in Utah County in Northern Utah, I see new forms of electric transportation practically every day. Today, I saw a new form and two more common forms within a few hundred yards of each other on the trail. The new form was the recumbent tandem etrike (electric trike) that you see in the photo below. I have been seeing recumbent etrikes for several years, but this is the first tandem I have observed.
More common is the regular recumbent etrike that we see below.
If your legs don’t work anymore, there is the arm-powered battery-electric recumbent bike that we see below.
Another solution for handicapped transportation is the “Not a Wheelchair” shown in the photo below.
A few yards down the trail, I saw the etrike that you see below. This is a variation on the trike that your 2-year-old granddaughter is riding, just adult sized and battery electric powered, which makes it practical for adults who are too balance compromised to ride a bicycle.
As I got off my ebike to take these pictures, a couple of boys on the electric motorcycle bike you see below stopped to see if I was in trouble. They informed me that the top speed of their bike is 60 mph!
And from a few days ago at the new huge Jump Track Park in Saint George, Utah, we see below a dad who wasn’t going to let his daughter miss out on the fun of riding the jumps in the park.
I’ve included this one just for fun, as it is not battery electric powered/assisted. However, it illustrates a new breed of child carrier for bikes that didn’t exist when my kids were little. This child carrier, in front of the rider, is particularly useful for very little children because you can keep close watch on them.
10 years ago, who would have thought that the ubiquitous Razor Scooter would have a battery electric version that kids and adults would be using for neighborhood and tourist transportation rentals all over the world? Who would have guessed that there would be full sized and mini (also seen below) electric versions of the classic Vespa scooter?
Who would have guessed that you would see rental electric scooters littered around cities all over the world just waiting for someone to jump aboard and ride?
The first small electric transporter that used modern lithium-ion batteries and microchip controllers was the Segway Human Transporter that was introduced in 2001. You see one below at a robotics competition I attended in Atlanta, Georgia, when I worked for NASA on April 17, 2004.
10 years later, in 2014, I had my first ebike and a Nissan LEAF electric car:
A modern implementation of the Segway technology is the Onewheel that you see below. It doesn’t have the handle bars of the Segway, which means the rider must be much more skilled. The speed and direction control are all actuated by the balancing of the rider.
Mom as one of 4 on an ebike — no problem, as we see below.
Even the classic skateboard that we see ridden by kids and adults has been electrified, as we see below. In this case, the speed control is done with a paired Bluetooth controller the rider activates in his pocket.
Ebikes aren’t just for adults. I see some very young kids riding Ebikes (see below) and mini electric motorcycles.
If you want the closest thing to an electric car, it’s a full-fledged electric motorcycle, as you see from the Zero motorcycle brand below. These can match or exceed the most powerful gas motorcycles in terms of acceleration, going from zero to 60 mph in about 3 seconds. The Zero SR/S shown below is approximately $20,000 and gives you a silky smooth commuter bike. With a range of only 82 miles at 70 mph and no native access to DC fast chargers, it’s not ideal as road trip bike. Although, with the available range extender battery, it should get you to the next charger. It has only Level 2 charging, but that is actually not too bad considering the small size of the vehicle and battery.
Electric transportation (or at least recreation) is not limited to land. We find it on the water as well. For example, we see an electric wakeboard in action in the photo below. The electric wakeboard eliminates the powerful gas V8 motor ski boat needed for wakeboarding.
Want personal electric transportation in the winter? Try the electric snowmobile shown below.
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