The Electric Tricycle Improved An Excellent Idea

By Edward Turner


City people everywhere can be seen utilizing electric mobility rather than expensive cars or laborious bicycles. In fact, the scooters we used to buy for our children has been powered up as the children have grown up. Nevertheless, us older folks have a problem keeping up unless we race them on our electric tricycle.

Children have been riding skateboard style scooters both with and without powered mobility for decades. Sometime in the late Nineties the pivoting stand-alone scooter was introduced, but most people had difficulty learning how to ride those effectively. The next wave of genius came when someone put the rechargeable motor from the pivoting model onto the skateboard scooter their kids were riding, and a new hazardous means of transport was born.

Balancing on both powered models is problematic for many people, and this becomes more true the older one gets. Traditional scooters force the rider to stand throughout their journey, and everyone knows it is more difficult on the body to stand still than to walk. For someone who has already worked a twelve-hour shift, or fifty years of twelve-hour shifts, this standing pose promotes stiffness and pain.

Even if the scooter is designed to fit adults, that upright handle is still too short. Yes, we know the pivot control model requires the short handle in order to pivot in all directions, but that is no excuse. No one is happy after standing hunched over for a harrowing four to six miles of city traffic.

Anyone riding upon such a contraption must be aware of the same dangers as any pedestrian. Only difference is, this pedestrian is moving at 8 to 15 mph, able to pass bicycles going uphill, and certainly capable of getting into catastrophic accidents. The older the rider, the more catastrophic the injuries are likely to be.

One is able to choose the style of seat they prefer. There are even sporty models that position the driver either leaning forward, or laying backward, in order to achieve greater speed through the magic of aerodynamics. Most of us are quite happy with a big, round seat that matches the size of our aging buttocks.

Since we are all notorious thrill seekers, breaks are a required element of the tricycles we speed about on. Scooters have not always included much of a breaking system, and this limits the operator to being a rider instead of a driver. Since there is the welfare of pedestrians, as well as the well-being of the rider/driver at stake, it only makes sense that one have adequate breaking availability at eight miles per hour.

A horn is a basic standard safety feature as well, and can potentially be the most fun safety feature ever. Trumpet horns are the most common, but there are other styles available. Headlamp and rear running lights come standard, but the addition of any other lights for night driving can only improve the visibility of and for the driver.

There is one safety feature that should be standard, but cannot be guaranteed. That feature is the knowledge and prudence of the person operating the vehicle. Tricycles are fashioned after a tripod design, but unless the driver holds on with both hands and keeps both feet on the pedals, this design is incomplete, and potentially unstable.




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