Modern Vespa

I'm about to finally buy a Vespa. I have a choice of Red, Black, Blue or Yellow. Since my wife will be riding this I'm concerned about visibility in traffic since the bike sits lower than a conventional motorcycle. Have any of you had trouble being seen on your scoot? As a long time motorcyclist being seen always seems to be a challenge and didnt know if this was discussed before.

TIA (thanks in advance)

Yellow for sure. I used to have a yellow Super 9 and I could not "hide" from people even if I wanted to. People would always comment on how obnoxiously loud(color, as well as noise) it was and they could always spot it.

Bowie eh? Maybe I'll see you around, I'm down there quite a bit.

Yellow is noticeable, maybe more so than red due to the lesser frequency I see of yellow cars on the road.

You may want to also check out the various threads on headlight modulators.

Descending order: Yellow, Red, Blue, Black

Wear a yellow, red or white helmet when you ride.

Yup. And you can increase your visibility even more with a bright riding jacket. Your body and head are (well, should be ) higher than your scooter and are often more visible to motorists than the scooter itself.

I ride a black scooter, so I chose a bright red jacket (with reflective piping), and a silver helmet (with a big reflective sticker on the back).

Every little bit helps.

I'm not sure which Vespa you are wanting, but I have found that my GT200 and a friends LX150 sit higher than quite a few "conventional bikes"

I agree with all of your comments. Good point on wearing bright gear. I have a blue BMW and wear a yellow mesh jacket and yellow helmet. If I stay with that and get the same for my wife I guess any color would work.

Thanks for the insight!

Hey Baltimore person, I dont know if you know about bike night at Peter's Inn, Fells point. Its a great place to meet up. I used to hold "meetings" there when I was rides chairman for the BMW club. Never actually held a meeting but used it as an excuse to go there. On nice nights they get a lot of bikes. Mostly Euro and sport, not many HD's.

WHITE!!! Best color for visibility in my opinion, however, I'm not up on the new colors, do they still make white?

I'm not sure the color really matters. Think of the myriad colors you see along the road -- cars, buildings, foliage, etc. -- does anyone thing really stand out? What I think is more noticeable is movement. That is why some people use headlight modulators - moving light. Others move from side to side in the lane to show movement out of the ordinary. Just read the number of threads that have "I didn't see you" somewhere in the message. I'm sure all of those riders weren't riding black scoots with black helmets and black jackets. Pick the color you like and drive defensively.

I agree with Griffin. Pick whatever color you like, and the rest is up to you. The one time I've been hit was on a bright silver scooter, with chrome, wearing a white helmet and a rainbow tie-dye shirt (I couldn't get much more noticible in the color department that day). If they're going to see you, it's not neccessarily going to be because of color. And there are a some colorblind drivers out there, too.

Sorry to hear about your wreck. Hope all is well since then. I believe that when a cage says "I didn't see him/her" I think the brain sees scooters and motorcycles but they get classified in the bicycle category, ie. slow and non-threat, so they pull out in front of you. I always felt safest in my sidecar since it was so odd looking, people did a double-take.

"black scoots with black helmets and black jackets."


Guilty,I'm afraid..

On a vespa:
yellow is joyful and sunny
red is sporty and intense
blue is elegant and relaxing
black is mysterious and fascinating


Choose the colour you like more and just keep the lights on....

So what's grey?

"blue is elegant and relaxing"

Hey, thats for me. I could use some elegance in my life. The new Scoot is on the way.
8)