LONDON: Office for Low Emission Vehicles (OLEV) has planned to make money available to get more electric scooters on to the roads of Britain. From the summer of 2015 up until 2020 there will be £7.5 million made available; there will be a cap of £1500 per vehicle.
By my brilliant maths (or the calculator on my computer) this will mean at least 5000 riders benefiting.
Getting people out of cars on to bikes is one way to ease congestion. However the lack of practicality and purely comfort are reasons some people don’t. After all we are known to have long winters in the UK and it is understandable people don’t want to be freezing their bits off every single day on the way to work, for quite a few months. And then too sweaty when do get hot summers days.
The hope is the scheme will help reduce CO2 as well as congestion.
Steve Kenward, the CEO of The Motorcycle Industry Association who has represented the motorcycle industry for over 100 years has said:
This is significant development as it recognises the part motorcycles and scooters will play in a low carbon future. Subsidy will encourage more people to opt for electric motorcycles and scooters, which will help solve the UK’s appalling congestion problem.
He also said:
We also hope it will give manufacturers who already have electric models for sale in mainland Europe the confidence to launch in the UK.
This would of course result in greater choice of models for people who are looking at moving from their car in to a motorbike. There are not huge amounts to choose from at the moment; at AtoB.org they have a good list. Or if you are an Amazon shopper believe it or not there is even a road legal one sold there for £1000! However it is classed under bicycle legislation and only has a top speed of 15mph. So its more of a gimmick and not an actual motorbike despite it looking like one, but it still shows the interest when people have bought it and left good reviews.
Some traditionalists may turn their nose up and want to stick with traditional fuel, others may just not want to appear to be a hippie to their peers. But there are some great products out there, the Zero SR is a fantastic bike, doing 0-100 KM/H in 3.3 seconds you are not going to be short of fun! You would probably need to also invest in lots of clean pairs of underpants, but we won’t go there.
However when you type in to their website to find a local dealer, the only result in the UK is one in Halesowen and that is “service only”. Whereas in Europe they have quite a lot, which highlights exactly what Steve Kenward has said, here is the map of dealers Zero have:
