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This is the gyroscopic Airwheel, which rotates at up to 18 km/h;
with a 15 to 23 km range and it weighs 10,6 kg. If trends for personal transport in California and Sweden holds sway, wheels like this may very well be how the rest of the world commute in the next two decades.
PHOTO: www.airwheels.net
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The Swedes have a plan to create such reliable, regular and cheap
public transport that it will not be worth the hassle and expense of owning a
car. The goal is to make public transport as ubiquitous as broadband, so that
citizens will be able to buy seat time on a bus or automated tram in the same
way they buy airtime for a smart phone.
In California the goal is perhaps more realistic, as outlined in a
report by Tom Turrentine, entitled California: Beyond Cars?, which was published
by the Bulletin
of the Atomic Scientist.
Turrentine said in the report smog over California is one of the
main drivers of the move to zero emission cars, which already include full
electric and hybrid vehicles, as well as vehicles powered by natural gas or
other fuels.
He notes, however, that smoke-free cars will only solve part of the
current inefficiencies in today’s transport systems.
“The average vehicle sits idle 23 of every 24 hours, costing its
owner money and occupying storage or parking space, but otherwise not doing very
much,” he wrote.
To make vehicles earn their keep, car sharing, bike sharing, and
the matching of unused vehicle space with potential passengers are just some of
the ideas on the near horizon in the Golden State.
In the next two decades, by 2024, Turrentine predicts Internet-based
services may for the first time make it possible to live in much of California
without owning a car, instead sharing cars or rides as needed.
He warns the transition will be slow, as “a complete turnover” of
the investment people make in a car takes a couple of decades, while research
and development of lithium batteries will probably also require another 20 years
to become affordable.
“Automated cars will have to compete on the road with non-automated
cars for a long time,” Turrentine predicts, adding “a web of regulations will be
needed to compete with existing transportation systems until niches are
discovered where the financial playing field tilts in favour of the technologies
of the future”.
He said other countries where similar trends are shaping up to make
personal transport more personal are Norway and the Netherlands, while bigger
players like Japan, China and Germany are still testing the waters.
• Last week several eyebrows in the industry were raised after I listed four developments which move us closer to the end of the car as we know it. My estimate is it will take 80 years — a whole new generation of car buyers — to change the current system of tax-incentivised and subsidised mass production, but if Turrentine’s predictions are right, this change will start happening by 2024.
• Last week several eyebrows in the industry were raised after I listed four developments which move us closer to the end of the car as we know it. My estimate is it will take 80 years — a whole new generation of car buyers — to change the current system of tax-incentivised and subsidised mass production, but if Turrentine’s predictions are right, this change will start happening by 2024.
