Suzanne Plunkett/AP
DCL
We've all seen them—the occasional man decked out in business casual attire awkwardly careening by at 10 miles per hour and the police officer attempting to maintain an authoritative disposition as he teeters forward on the indisputably humorous-looking Segway.
So what do you do? Glance curiously at the Segway as it goes by? Make fun of it and its riders? Wonder if it's the future of greener transportation?
Okay, so you probably didn't do the latter. But it's a question worth posing: is the Segway a step forward towards a lower emissions transportation future, or a waste of space that deserves every Arrested Development-related jibe you send its way?
For starters, Segways are run on electric propulsion, and give off no emissions during operation. They require electricity to charge its lithium battery, and each charge gets you around 24 miles of driving (scooting? wobbling? Don't know which jargon to use...). You can envision it as a tiny, odd-looking electric car. There's even a new model called the PUMA that can reach speeds up to 35 mpg. And you can make the argument that using the Segway instead of driving for trips around town is the much greener option.
And you'd be right—as Segway's website points out, you're emitting 14 times more greenhouse gases when you drive—but only to a point.
Because, as I recall, there's another form of transportation that you can use around town for short, emissions-free trips: it's called a bike. And you don't even have to use electricity to power it up—oh yeah, and you get exercise in the process.
Thing is, that vehicle requires its rider to be somewhat in shape—which is unfortunately anathema to many modern vehicle operators. So ideally, everyone would be driving less, biking more, and laughing it up at those who shell out $4500 for a Segway. But until we find a way to shift the paradigm away from laziness in general—which rising oil prices might help to do, eventually—those who opt to do around-the-town errands on the Segway are making a greener choice.
But, we do reserve the right to crack a couple jokes at the rider's expense. I mean, come on, the thing looks hilarious.
