Icycle on thin ice mobility scooter6/21/2023 On this rough section, the Neuron was quite uncomfortable to ride and an inexperienced rider might find its vibration quite hard to handle. Its colour and texture match the wide median strip of Anzac Parade that runs all the way from this point to the War Memorial so that everything looks uniform and monumental in tourist photos. This section is covered with a very coarse, rough red asphalt. My turnaround and photography point for each ride was the ceremonial centre-line of Canberra, which directly runs through the peak of Mount Ainslee, and the centres of the War Memorial, Old Parliament House and New Parliament House. Its very beefy front fork has no flex whatsoever. Both encourage you to take up a longer term hire or subscription package to save money per ride.Īs a safety feature, the Neuron defaults to 15 kph maximum and you have to press the Toggle Speed button to go to 25 kph, provided the geo-restricting system allows it depending upon your location. Both the scooter systems are expensive if you hire them casually as I did. The first scooter I tried was the bright orange Neuron. Neuron You can see how steep the Neuron’s head tube is and how the fat fork blades offer no rake or other form of vertical compliance. They’re also brilliant the moment the road or path starts sloping upwards. E-bikes overcome the necessary heavyweight that all share bikes need to be to have the durability and abuse resistance required. I think that bike share schemes will need to become fully electric to keep up with the competition. It’s little wonder that scooter share worldwide has taken just two years to reach the same level of ridership that it took bike share 20 years to reach. This front light was not working.Īirbike was by far the cheapest option at $2.70, but the least enjoyable. The solar-powered headlight was not working and looked like it may have either leaked or shorted due to condensation entering the small solar panel. In fact, I’ve ridden several different airless tyre designs over the past 20 years and they seem to be improving because these were the best airless tyres that I’d ridden. The tyres themselves handled quite well, considering they’re airless. You can see where the front tyre was bulging off the rim, causing a bumpy ride. It turned out that the front wheel’s airless tyre was not seated into the rim properly in one section, causing a big bulge. Then I soon noticed a pronounced ‘bump, bump, bump’ when I was riding. I managed to fix that by bending the mudguard back into place with the sole of my shoe. At first, the front wheel would not rotate freely. Then there were mechanical condition issues. This grip was way too narrow, even for my skinny ‘office worker’ hands. That made riding this bike an uncomfortable, unenjoyable experience. So perhaps I’m slightly taller than average, but the maximum seat height was about 150mm (6 inches) too low for me. I’m 182 cm tall or exactly six feet in the old scale. It’s less than half the length it needs to be. There a bikes with even smaller wheels that comfortably accommodate tall adults, but the Airbike’s seatpost is equally vertically challenged. There’s nothing wrong with small wheels in themselves. Its proportions look about normal, but when you realise that those wheels are not 700c or even 26 inch, but 24 inch, you start to see how tiny this bike is. But the Airbike comes with some serious disadvantages. Normally you’d think that a bicycle is the best option for higher speed and longer distances when compared with a scooter. Of the tourists, it appeared like a 50% split between Neuron and Beam scooters being used, but I only saw one Airbike being ridden. But I suspect that most of the regular hirers use them in the city centre for short week-day commutes.ĭespite the 13 degree maximum temperature and overcast skies, there were plenty of tourists who were enjoying the same path along with lots of locals, mainly on road bikes, but some on scooters. Many scooter hires are for riding along this stretch. I rode all three options for a short, out and back ride on an identical route along the northern shore of Lake Burley Griffin. There wasn’t any ice on the path at 2pm, but it regularly gets below zero overnight in Canberra during winter! On a chilly mid-winter’s afternoon, I took the opportunity to test ride all three of Canberra’s shared bike and scooter alternatives, Neuron, Beam and Airbike.Īirbike offers conventional, non-electric bicycles in a dockless share system. As we have previously written about, Canberra’s two competing scooter-share schemes are booming. It’s also one of the first places to legalise the riding of e-scooters. Canberra is widely considered to be the best cycling city in Australia.
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