Electric micro mobility offers holds huge promise. Allow me a short thread with some observations.
The first is that we should not be so surprised. The car has become the norm but when you think about it that's pretty abnormal: moving around in a huge box of 1500 kg instead of walking isn't normal. And that everybody needs their own box is ludicrous.
I understand the appeal: it makes you feel safe, comfortable and important. But the safety is a mirage of course. It's the same kind of safety you get when everybody carries a gun. A city would be much safer if very few people had cars (or guns). 
And the comfort is a bit strange too. This idea that we should move around in a lazy chair as if we were in front of the TV with the world displayed on our windscreen. It takes the whole experience out of travelling and now we must take the car to the fitness studio.
For many people it is about status. Look at me! My car is bigger, more expensive and more powerful than yours!
This makes me a bit sad but mostly I think: let's give them something less dangerous and with less impact on the environment that let's them keep up.
This makes me a bit sad but mostly I think: let's give them something less dangerous and with less impact on the environment that let's them keep up.
I mean, when you can be manipulated into thinking that your self worth is tied up to a metal box for moving around in you can also be manipulated into thinking it's tied up into something else.
And face it: cars isolate us from each other and make us dangerous to each other. The idea that cars should be allowed into every nook and cranny of an environment that should be about connecting, relaxing and kids playing is an anomaly.
And here sharing comes in. Sharing is totally logical once you take out the "I need my personal status symbol" and especially once self driving turns many vehicles into taxis. It takes much less city space and offers more freedom.
Most importantly: sharing allows you to choose your vehicle on a trip by trip basis. So when you want to move from one crowded part of the city to another crowded part over a distance of say 5 km and you are free to choose your vehicle, micro mobility is simply more logical.
One more thing I should add here: roads are fractals. Mobility should be more aware of this. So trucks and large cars are fine for highways but we should be able to switch to smaller and smaller vehicles at the fringes of the fractal.
So I really think we should redesign cities from the ground up, assuming ubiquitous shared micro mobility on top of public transit. The car had it's time, now let's move on.
What roads would we need? What would feel natural to people? How do we picture the ideal city?
What roads would we need? What would feel natural to people? How do we picture the ideal city?
In the Netherlands the bike is very popular and that's makes cities more livable than cars. But bikes are not the end all of mobility. I would ask the advocates not to try and expel all other mobility from the bicycle paths.
I am especially encouraged by roads where the car is a guest and has to move at low speeds. Some are designed so well that I (as a car driver) feel like a big oaf that has to move slowly and carefully while micro mobility whizzes by.
Basically, the car is the culmination of an era that made everyone strive for a vehicle that could take the entire family everywhere. But it's wasteful, isolates us, and makes us a danger to each other. It's high time we moved beyond this simplistic ideal. /end
