I disagree that it's a move in the wrong direction. When I got a scooter at 15 it suddenly opened up my world - I could ride it to other cities and meet distant friends after school, and just get a lot more things done without having to involve my parents. It was an incredible mobility improvement for a young person, and I imagine this will serve the exact same purpose.
And I rode a bicycle at the same time - me and my friends used to cycle 2-3 times per week, 100-120km per day, just for fun. But that's not a good option to go with friends to a cinema, when the nearest one is 45 minute bicycle ride away along major roads. A scooter improved that ability immensly, and I'm sure a small car will as well.
I don't doubt your story, but I still have doubts that scooters or minicars are the right fix.
45 minutes doesn't seem like a big deal, most people, especially in cities, probably live a lot closer to a cinema, and the main issue is dangerous main roads without sufficient cycle infrastructure.
Taming car traffic in cities and providing easy to use cycle infrastructure would be enormously more beneficial across the board that a competition for "fast as legally possible" mini cars and scooters, even electric ones.
And it never occurred to you that maybe the whole concept of lack of public transportation was at fault?
I didn't get my drivers licence until I was 23 and I didn't miss out on anything, because I could (and did) travel the whole country via train and bus - despite growing up in the countryside. The train station was just under 2km away and that helped immensely and had regular service (2 times an hour) to the nearest cities.
>>And it never occurred to you that maybe the whole concept of lack of public transportation was at fault?
Sure it did. What kind of power does a 15 year old have, exactly, to influence it though? A scooter has improved my mobility when I was 15. Going on the internet and saying that the lack of public transport is at fault would have not.
Besides, we do have really good public transport! It's just that even with buses running every 30 minutes it can still take a long time to get anywhere if you live couple towns over from where you need to be. So it's like.....45 minute bike ride, 15 minute scooter ride, or 1.5 hour bus ride because you have to swap buses twice? Not everything works for everyone, not everyone lives in the major cities. I didn't live out in the countryside either, but in a collection of smaller towns 4-5km apart, 10k population each.
> What kind of power does a 15 year old have, exactly, to influence it though? A scooter has improved my mobility when I was 15. Going on the internet and saying that the lack of public transport is at fault would have not.
True, of course.
But it's not about the individual 15 year old scooter owner who makes an individual decision to get a scooter, when they live outside the city, in a situation where it benefits them greatly, etc etc.
It's about the systemic impact of legalising a class of vehicles and thus adding hundreds of thousands more vehicles to the road network. People in situations where they could have happily stayed on public transport instead move to driving these small vehicles, which aren't as bad as full-sized cars but still consume resources and occupy valuable road and parking space. Fewer public transport users means fewer voters who care about public transport, and more who care about roads. That's not a step in the right direction.
(I grew up in rural Australia, I understand why you need private motorised transport to get around - but plenty of the customers who are going to be buying this Ami vehicle are going to be in extremely dense urban areas.)
People’s lives, especially the adolescent phase thereof, are short. I don’t blame them one bit for maximizing their mobility.
If you want public transport adopted, make it effective and reasonably efficient and people will use it. Crimping people’s mobility in the meantime to garner support for better public transport at some time in the distant future is not likely to work well.
> And it never occurred to you that maybe the whole concept of lack of public transportation was at fault?
This is an extremely good point.
The city where I live, Milan (Italy) has truly exceptional public transport, accessed via a single cheap monthly pass (39€/month, includes all subways, trams and buses).
It's so good that my gf got her driving license at 27 and she didn't even had to do it, she got it "just in case", and to occasionally use the car sharing services available in the city.
Her mother has a driving license but never drives, and despite this has been going to work and has been doing her things without a car for the last 32 years (!!!)
Trains are just an anecdotal example - today we also have "dial a ride" services, where you can call for a bus (during operating hours).
Once your population density goes below a certain threshold, individual traffic isn't a problem anyway. This isn't the case, however, with most of Europe.
To be honest, I'm not so sure where most of Europe falls on the "viability of public transport" spectrum. But that dial a ride service sounds like a nice alternative for otherwise too rural regions.
I agree 100%. I didn’t get my license until I was 22, and looking back I strongly feel like it was a mistake. There was just so much missed opportunity in being stuck within the range human power can get you.
Nope. We used to cycle to the mountains nearby then cycle back couple times a week after school and then at least once on the weekend. On road bikes we were averaging ~40km/h so it was only 3-4 hours total, maybe less if we were pushing it. Not to boast but I was super buff back then, leg muscles like steel lol.
And I rode a bicycle at the same time - me and my friends used to cycle 2-3 times per week, 100-120km per day, just for fun. But that's not a good option to go with friends to a cinema, when the nearest one is 45 minute bicycle ride away along major roads. A scooter improved that ability immensly, and I'm sure a small car will as well.