Innovative devices help commuters go the last mile
As trains, buses and subways unload across America, some commuters emerge carrying a variety of odd contraptions to speed them to the workplace, from folding electric bikes to self-balancing one-wheelers.
This is the work of innovators trying to solve the problem of what transportation experts call the first and last mile — getting from home to public transportation and then from there to the office.
“It doesn’t matter how good and clean and safe public transportation is. If [commuters] can’t get to it, or it is too far from their work, it is a huge turn-off for people,” says Geoff Wardle, executive director of graduate transportation systems and design at ArtCenter College of Design in Pasadena, Calif.
Getting around a city without your own car is getting easier on many fronts, with ride- and car-sharing services growing and with bike-sharing programs appearing in cities around the globe. Designers and companies are looking to fill in those last-mile gaps, Wardle says, sometimes inspired by the “bold” but ultimately “half-baked” Segway, the self-balancing, two-wheeled conveyance introduced to much fanfare in 2001.
Wardle, who also teaches on the subject, says transportation now should be viewed holistically. In his classes, “We are completely agnostic about what type of transportation we work on.”
Forward-thinking automakers such as Ford realize the days of just building cars to transport people are ending. Ford hired global design firm Ideo to study “multimodal transportation,” which patches together all modes of travel. Ideo designers took to the streets of Chicago experimenting with — and timing — different methods of making short urban trips. Another sign of the times: 2016’s L.A. Auto Show billed itself as “AutoMobility LA” and showcased more than cars and trucks.
The URB-E — a folding electric bike — was one device on display there. The $899 URB-E Sport has a comfortable seat, speeds up to 14 mph on a lithium ion battery, and folds up in seconds. In 2016, the company, headquartered in Pasadena, sold 3,000 URB-Es in 26 countries, says Evan Saunders, URB-E’s head of sales.
“We are trying to take more cars off the road,” Saunders says. “People are waking up to the fact that a commute that used to be 20 minutes is now an hour.” U.S. Census Bureau statistics confirm that commute times have risen 20 percent since 1980.
The first requirement for a successful transportation device is it has to be big enough so “you don’t look like a circus act” when riding it, says Wardle. But devices also have to be reasonably affordable, light, foldable, safe and legal.
In the brave new world of commuting, Boston engineering firm BSC Group redesigns roads to be “complete streets,” says Peter Reed, BSC’s manager of highway engineering (and brother of this reporter). "We used to design roads from the inside out, first for cars, then pedestrians and cyclists. Now we design from the outside in, addressing pedestrians, then bicyclists and then vehicles."
These days it’s not unusual to catch a glimpse of someone gliding by on a vehicle and think, “What the heck was that?” Besides the self-balancing and famously combustible “hoverboard” is the gravity-defying, $2,295 Solowheel Xtreme, a self-balancing single wheel with footrests on the sides.
Another unusual-looking vehicle is the Stator electric scooter, with fat tires and low center of balance that lets you jump on and off without putting down a kickstand. As an ArtCenter student, Nathan Allen got the idea for his invention by watching children jump off moving scooters and simply let them crash to the ground. He says he plans to raise money through Kickstarter.com and hopes to begin production soon.
Allen says many devices, while practical, fail because people decide, “I don’t want to be seen on that thing.” With the Stator, Allen aims for both practical and aesthetic appeal.
Some people, after experimenting, just return to the original first-mile vehicle: the bicycle. Wardle says it’s hardly surprising since it remains “the most calorie-efficient way to move people on the planet.” Perhaps, he suggests, the mayor of Los Angeles should designate one Thursday a month as two-wheel-only day.
Philip Reed is a staff writer at NerdWallet, a personal finance website. Email: preed@nerdwallet.com.
NerdWallet is a USA TODAY content partner providing general news, commentary and coverage from around the web. Its content is produced independently of USA TODAY.
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