NEWS (16 Oct 2020): Just weeks after bright orange NEURON MOBILITY electric scooters arrived on Canberra's streets, a second player has entered the market, complete with their own distinctive colour.
BEAM MOBILITY is the latest company to launch an e-scooter service in the capital, with its vivid purple scooters arriving on Thursday.
It's expected 750 scooters will be seen in Canberra in coming weeks, with 150 of them available from the first day of operation.
Brisbane council is installing dedicated bicycle lanes throughout the inner city. They thought that this pop-up initiative could be achieved really quickly and easily when traffic was down during COVID-19. However the relatively swift return of vehicles to Brisbane roads, meant the window of opportunity closed too quickly.
Which begs the question, why isn't Melbourne taking advantage of our extended lockdown to do something similar? There is a clear and obviousneed to reduce the load on public transport out the other side of this extended COVID lockdown and EScooters, E-bikes and bicycles simply have to be part of the solution.
The UK have fast-tracked an E-Scooter scheme in the wake of COVID-19. E-Bikes were made legal in New York City in April 2020.
What are we doing, Melbourne? Now is the time to act.
Read the full story in theBrisbane Times (18 Aug) HERE