Modern Vespa

I think that resistance to having public transportation as a solution, correlates to a lack of access. That includes the fear of being prohibited to own a car.

Generally, in areas (and countries) with well developed access to state of the art public transportation, the acceptance is high, as it usually improves the quality of life. People in locations where this is the case, usually don't fear that they live at the dawn of an age where private cars will disappear or pried out from under them.

This is unlikely to happen in my lifetime in the US, in any but the densest of city centers.

Agreed. For the most part public transport is unavailable in this country.

Where I am at the moment (West London, UK) there's almost no need to own a car.

Here in GR we have a pretty evolved public transport system. Still, the problem is you are on the transport system's schedule. My daughter has relied on it for the last several years. It takes a lot of planning (which she's never been particularly good at) and at the end of the day you are dependent on another system. And that's what I see with most of these discussions. People don't want to be dependent on something else, whether it's big oil, or the electric grid or the gubbermint. And to a degree, I'm in that camp. I am fiercely independent in some regards. And painting men with a broad brush I think we all have that in us. I want to be able to be self reliant.

We paid off our house so we don't owe the bank for that. We have no car payments. Everything we have we own. If it weren't cost prohibitive I'd probably be off grid entirely so I didn't have to pay for utilities. Some people do that and they make reality tv shows about them. My trigger point is I'd rather buy hamburger and buns at the local grocery than shoot a bear and make bread.

I get the fear people have of losing independence. I love being able to hop in my car (or on my bike or scooter or whatever) and go where I want when I want.

The other issue with busing systems is they are only as good as the territory they cover. Back to my daughter, she had an eye specialist the bus didn't travel to. She could take the bus to the edge of the route and then it was a 2.5 mile walk to the doctor. Is it raining on the day of your appointment? Snowing? You can't always plan for that.

Anything outside the range of public transport systems and you need to provide your own.

Sorry, that post was disjointed and rambling, but I wanted to say a lot of different things. Going to be one of THOSE days, I can see already.

Indeed they are, along with Amazon Delivery Vans and the more savvy Taxi company owners.

Hopefully Freight Company owners will follow suit on their fleets of Lorrys once they work out the savings on fuel and maintenence.

My company makes the tail lamps for the Amazon Rivian delivery vans.



Seven separate lamps in total.

I think the public transportation options everywhere in the US (with very few exceptions) pale in comparison to what you'll find in a lot of other world cities, and even the smaller cities outside of the US. And this, I think, is probably why my fellow Americans are so wound-up about cars, and personal independence, and so on -- we've collectively just never seen a world where there are viable alternatives. Only something like 56% of US citizens own a valid passport, which is a shamefully low number, IMO. But hey, that's up sharply from just a few years before, when only 40% of US citizens owned a passport. So, progress?

And the lack of public transportation options in the US is itself a function of car culture. Americans above a certain financial class just don't need or use public transportation, because everyone has a car. As one does.

So it's a vicious cycle. And it's not likely to change in my lifetime. The US will forever be doomed to having too many cars and not enough public transportation options.

Even the prospect of ICE cars going away and being replaced by EVs is enough to get a pretty significant subset of Americans wound up, simply because they can't imagine the arc of progress that will make this change a non-issue. Again, our collective lack of imagination -- an innate American inability to envision the alternatives -- seems to be the root cause.

I think we might be doomed. Collectively speaking, of course.

Indeed, Americans are a different people with some substantial self-imposed limitations. We tell ourselves you could never really use EVs in a cold climate - and ignore the success they have had in Norway. We say national health plans could never succeed - and ignore the successes in Japan, or France, or Germany. We struggle with high speed rail - while many other countries operate successful and expanding systems. And the list goes on. You'd think we wouldn't really need too much imagination when we can simply look out there at functioning alternatives - but we consistently refuse to look or learn.

The rules & who gets to write/enforce them determine the winners & losers,
always have, always will
Changing means there's different money to make
The current winners don't want to change/adapt if they can grease the wheels & keep the gravy train rolling

That sounds suspiciously like corruption.

(I'm firmly against corruption).

Having both seems to be a good play at this time in history, if electricity gets expensive or you want to go on a long road trip take the ICE mobile.

I think my hybrid with 400+ range and quick fill ups is a good compromise.

My neighbor who has a long daily commute is saving a bundle with his EV compared to his 6 cylinder ICE mobile, he has home charging and free work charging.
Also neighbor has a co-worker that takes their EVs on longer road trips, they have had issues finding working, available charging stations but have been offered extra theft insurance for $10 bucks from the homeless that tend to congregate at some of the out of the way charging stations.

Ordered one of these this morning. Kaabo Mantis 8 on sale for about $950. Free 2-6 day shipping. 25mph/25 mile range.

nope

I was referring specifically to this:

tangentially relevant to the topic:

In Finland, we are fast going towards the 'tip over' phase in electric cars.

Our's is a tiny country, so this helps in the infrastructure. 2022 the coverage of public charging points already became quite OK. This year the number of especially fast (and very fast ) charging points literally...hmmm...charges forward.

At the same time EVs have became cool. It takes a lot of guts for a new premium car buyer to get anything else. Secondhand market is still small, but growing all the time. Budget car buyers increasingly wish to have their share of 'premium movement', lower cost EVs from known reliable brands e.g. Volkswagen arouse lots of attention - not available yet, but will be soon.

There's a guy in East Grand Rapids (a very affluent neighborhood) who has one of these babies sitting out in front of his house quite often.



For those not aware, it's the BMW CE-04. 75mph, 80 mile range, 500lbs. Also nearly $12K. THIS is a really cool article / review.

I drive by it all the time. I've seen him on it once. I was on my Aprilia 50 and gave him an awkward thumbs-up. (glad I was wearing my full face helmet; he'll never recognize me)

I drive by his house a lot. It's on one of my favorite urban rides. One of these days I'll just stop and ring the doorbell and ask him about it. I KNOW he parks it out front so it's visible, so I KNOW he wants to talk about it. He also has a Tesla Model S in the drive. I have the 500e and a Segway Ninebot, so we already have a lot in common.

yup, it's been discussed plenty on this forum.

performance specs about the same a an HPE but half the range and costs more. more evolution needed before they interest me

Unfortunately they are also sitting in dealerships. 14.5k MSRP plus tax, tags, etc. The real world mileage is in the 60 range. Local dealers are trying to sell the demo's and trade ins. Just not ready for prime time, not in my area anyway. I am a fan of BEV but they have a way to go as far as two wheels.

Kind of like the Elletrica. Our local dealer said he would never have another one in the store.

I've seen the same here, I so want them to get this right.

I considered an Elettrica, but it's just so cost prohibitive. I did the math, and for the money, even at $4.00/gal, I can ride my Aprilia 50 about 150K miles. And I can't modify the Vespa it to go any faster than 30mph.

Arrived last Friday. This morning was the first ride to work on its first FULL charge.

My initial thoughts.

It's built like a tank. At just over 50lbs I really hope I don't actually have to carry it anywhere.

It's super quick. In dual motor mode it gets to 25mph as fast as I'd want it to.

The manual is atrocious. It contradicts itself and says nothing about the password you need to get into the setup parameters. (Thank you, YouTube)

I'm not sure about the range yet. They claim 25 miles and one of the better reviews I watched online said that even full bore it got 18 miles. We live in a fairly hilly area, so I may be disappointed.

The included front case is big enough to hold the charger. I like that.

Instead of the one Allen wrench included shown in the manual, they sent and entire foldy tool kit that includes three sockets and what might be a fish scaler. That's nice.

Except you can buy an Electricca that is built to go 45 mph. Having said that, I agree that the range needs to go up, and the price down, before they are really ready for prime time.

And in Michigan - at that point - I have to register it as a motorcycle because it exceeds 30mph. So tags and insurance for a motorcycle that tops out at 45.

At those prices I'd just ante up for a GTS.

Get these in Seattle.

And I was right. Last week I was riding by and he was sitting out in the front yard. I did a U-turn and parked the Aprilia squarely in his driveway.

Super cool guy, we talked for probably half an hour. Seems he grew up with his Dad owning a Harley dealership. When he moved to the burbs his dresser was just sitting so he sold it and didn't replace it. Until this came along. He loves it.

In his defense, he's a former Zuma rider, so he has scooter cred as well. It was a nice review from a real owner.

If I was commuting to work I'd give serious consideration to a plug in electric but I haven't been a commuter in 35 years.

We live 9.5 miles as the crow flies from downtown Knoxville, a 15-18 minute drive/ride. However it is impossible for us to go anywhere by public transit without first walking over 3 miles to the nearest bus stop. I discovered this when out of curiosity I decided to see how long it would take to get yo the YMCA were I to attempt it by public transit. It takes me 12-14 minutes by scooter or car depending on whether I take the freeway or not. Conclusion was from 1.5 to 2.25 hours depending on whether I arrived at the bus stop just before or just after the bus arrived at the nearest stop. The bus only runs once an hour and the last bus to visit that stop is at 5:05. If you live downtown or near the University of Tennessee you could manage on public transit but you don't have to live far from the city center to make that impossible.

Knoxville is a city with 200,000 with a major university (30,000+ students) and the metro area surrounding it has over 900,000 when you include Oakridge and Maryville (within25 mile radius from downtown). With Oakridge and UT there is good technology infrastructure on the are in both public (KUB utility provider is rolling out 10megabit internet all across its grid) and private (up to 5 megabit internet from ATT & Comcast) and growing perhaps a bit too rapidly but public transit sucks.


Heck, even in Houston public transit sucks. It would take 1:20 minutes to take a bus from our old house there to the zoned high school which was 3.1 miles away. Walking was faster but my son rode a Buddy 125..

Etherweight Enduro - Surron Ultra Bee Review
- FortNine

Cool review.

I can personally relate: a few years back I got a Suzuki VanVan200 to explore small gravel roads and paths not unlike the trails in the vid.

I chose VanVan, because it is very light, has huge amount of traction, is low enough for a shorty, has quiet exhaust and....here's another difference, has a comfy seat to rest on

Still, in the middle of woods, I already then though that an electric engine would be a perfect fit. It would have been nice to generate even less noise. Also, I can see the benefits of a bike being fully hand operated at tight spots. All reductions in weight are good too, although VanVan was not bad at all.

It's so easy to drop the bike in trail riding that I may personally be past these already. I've learned that according to MDs, in many body parts the 'best before' date for healing is already gone for me

We're being spoilt in the U.K. https://maeving.com/products/maeving-rm1s

After whinging not too long ago about how nothing electric meets my needs (https://modernvespa.com/forum/post2623074#2623074), it looks like Honda is now selling something that checks everything on my very-specific-but-not-very-powerful list. I think this may be the first product that uses the new "standard" battery pack for small cc vehicles that was being worked on by the Japanese manufacturers plus Piaggio and KTM? Note the Gogoro-like format and ease, as well as the standalone charger.

If so, I personally am pretty excited by this and hope that they consider bringing it into our market.

From:

Aaand, it looks like Honda might be going for a little bit of fun again: the Motocompacto rides again https://motocompacto.honda.com/!

This is just far enough up on the convenient/weird/not-that-expensive/small/fun scale that I'm going to see if I can get my hands on one for a test ride.

Or taking better care of what we have. Also, stop collecting stuff and let it sit unused (something I'm guilty of, so I should not be preaching ). How many have 2-3, or more, bikes or scooters sitting in a garage. Then have a problem keeping them running. Batteries charged and carburetors functional.
How about selling the unused ones? Only keep the ones you like most. Then "Use it up, wear it out ".

I had the same conundrum as some of these other folks. The electric Vespa/Piaggio were as expensive (or more) than an ICE Vespa or Piaggio. Yet they were basically in the 50cc class of performance. Why would I spend that sort of money on an electric that can't even be safely taken on a 55mph city/county road? The Piaggio 1 Active is basically limited to 35mph in the real world. It's a 'moped' according to the DMV here. But it is twice as expensive as a 50cc Honda Metropolitan, that actually makes more power. Step up to the 70kph Electtrica, and you're spending GTS300 money. That's why I eventually wound up with the Primavera 150. If I was going to spend that sort of money, I didn't want to be relegated to 35mph zones close to home. Heck, most of the city stroads around where I live are above 35mph anyway!

Someone at Vespa/Piaggio or BMW or Honda or someone NOT from some unknown company in China needs to come up with an electric scooter that can go: 50+mph for 50+ miles and NOT cost a fortune.

Seriously, if I could have bought an electric that could be safely taken on a 45mph-55mph road without being at full throttle, had a real world range of say 50 miles, and paid something like $6500 out the door, I would have walked into the dealership with my pen in my hand, ready to sign.

But instead, they are one, or a combination, of these things:
Too slow; range is too short; or they are too bloody expensive.

I would like to see a Piaggio 2 Active with a 50 real world range (not crawling at 15mph), a top sustainable speed of at least 50mph, and a price more like a Primavera/Sprint. Do that, and you will steal all sorts of business from the fly-by-night Chinese companies.

I started this thread about five years ago.
Some things have changed faster than I thought, some slower. I'll guess that's how predicting future normally goes.

Around here, in Finland:

- 'scoots' as they are called here, electric powered, easily accessible rental scooters are lying everywhere. And used everywhere. 5 years ago I thought that I live in a too small town to see them around - wrong, in a typical morning I'll see 2-3 these readily placed conveniently for use in my closest street. Lots of discussion on setting helmet use mandatory due to the high number of severe accidents, but at the moment one can ride these naked if wish. Well, mayby not literally.

-electrically assisted fat bikes. These are the most common electric(ally assisted) two wheelers that people own themselves. Fat bikes are annoyingly heavy to pedal and take some battery reserves too, but they are nice here where we have plenty of snow and slippery conditions. It seems though, that 'normal' electrically assisted bikes are starting to win in numbers.

-people seem to love these small, fat tyre, cheaply manufactured monstorisities. Not big in numbers, but I see some every day. Typically speeding past way too fast and way toi close when I'm walking the dog. The dog hasn't catched any yet, but one day...

Larger electric motorcycles? Never seen on a street yet, only showroom examples.

Smaller 'traditional' electric scooters and motorcycles? Some Vespa Elettricas, some Chinese 'old scooter lookalikes', but quite rare.

I didn't see in a search where anyone had posted about CFMOTO's ZEEHO electric scooters. Pretty impressive specs, really.

75mph, 60+mile range, 4 hr charging time.

LINK

They also make one called the Cyber.

Brand
CF Moto
Battery
21700
Model
Battery Life
2500 cycles
Power
10 kW (13.4 hP)
Range
80.8 miles
Charge Time
120 minutes
Top Speed
68.4 mph

Quality of life seems better in suburban sprawl than dense cities but good zip codes are expensive and you need a car, well not us, we can ride our motorbikes and bicycles for primarily transportation if we ever had to.

Not sure about the South but use to have relatives in the mid-west, they're just regularly folk, fiercely independent, want to be left alone, especially the oldies, a-lot came from a farming upbringing and have skills of many tradesmen. I'd guess Midwestern hillbillies and Southerners live by the similar mantras, don't F with anyone don't certainly don't take shat from anyone.

You still moving to Portugal?
I'm staying here in CA for a few more years but will probably relocate when the kids finish school, I want help get them set up somewhere where they can afford houses.

Still waiting on a visa. My wife has hers, mine is in the ether somewhere.

Can't really make any solid plans until we get solid approval for both of us.

Kawasaki is now dipping its toe:

https://www.kawasaki.com/en-us/motorcycle/z/supernaked/z-e-1

Taking orders now, apparently.

A few thoughts for my use case:

* Looks nice, ABS, etc.
* $7,599 MSRP...hm that's maybe interesting, depending on what's offered
* ~125cc grah! At that price point, I need to be able to get over the Bridge legally
* Plugable and removable batteries--awesome and makes it usable at my apartment; looks like a slick format
* However, it does not look like the new battery standard that the majors finalized, so that's disappointing--I'd hate to jump in on dead-end tech

In the end, given what I'd be able to legally use it for, the Motocompacto still probably has it beat as it's almost in "impulse buy" territory. I wish it was ~150cc for as long as the battery lasts; it probably makes sense in Japan and other places where there is more of a 125/150cc distinction. I feel like it's getting so close. Sigh~