Neat little things, but bicycle will always be my main ride. From the rain you can just cover yourself with a poncho :P
And I definitely share your sentiment with cars; really expensive and unnecessary, especially to own one.
Neat little things, but bicycle will always be my main ride. From the rain you can just cover yourself with a poncho :P
And I definitely share your sentiment with cars; really expensive and unnecessary, especially to own one.
Well, the velomobiles are pretty much bicycles. They're just enclosed. That first option is a bit of a velomobile, but not really. There were a few actual velomobiles that I could possibly import, with different levels of difficulty.
It's a lot easier over in Europe, or in Asia.
It's a bit hard to get everything done with a bike. The usual problem is heat rather than rain. On a hot day it really sucks to ride quite a ways with a load of groceries. I'd be fine with pedal assist though. Most of the time you only need to go just a little bit faster than a bike would with a minor electric motor assist.
You actually pick up a bit of speed with it just being enclosed with a bit of aerodynamics. Velomobiles that are properly aerodynamic can easily get you up to highway speeds with just the rider pedaling. I don't see why we don't have more electric assist vehicles to take you and a few groceries around town for far less than a car would cost.
Yeah, a velomobile with electric assistance would make much more sense for groceries and small stuff than a car. I guess that's what they're already doing in Asia with their tuktuks and such, though without electricity.
But here what I've seen, the closest equivalent is a microcar – the rich kids' toy. The only reason those have any market is that you are allowed to drive it at 15 – with a proper car you have to be 18 – so impatient kids with rich parents can drive a "car" three years earlier. "Rich", because they can cost 10 000€+. I don't understand why would anyone's parent purchase such thing, seems less worth than the amount of shit of an equal value.
I think some of the "microcars" make sense as far as the mileage but a lot of them are overpriced. I keep waiting for them to import more stuff from Asia so we can get some cheaper cars. But you guys do at least have more small cars over there that get pretty good mileage. Of course, some of them are WAY too cramped for the crappy mileage they get.