News

Electric assist bicycles are set to revolutionise cycling in Britain, according to the Environmental Transport Association (ETA). Sales of bicycles are booming and commuting on two wheels is enjoying a renaissance in urban areas, but from a nationwide perspective cycling in decline. Many urban commuters cycle to beat congestion and keep...

The £5,000 grant for buyers of electric cars, which seemed under threat when business secretary, Vince Cable, failed to mention it in the recent emergency budget, will go ahead in January 2011. £230m had been pledged for the Plug-in Grant, but the government has now reduced this to £43m with a review in January 2012. The revised fund will...

Royal Mail claims that increasingly heavy loads are the reason behind its decision to withdraw delivery bicycles in favour of diesel-powered vans. An increase in the number of books and DVDs ordered through online retailers such as Amazon has increased the size and weight of post bags. Paul Tolhurst, Royal Mail’s field operations director,...

The need to reduce the amount of gas emitted each day by cattle is more than simply a question of good farmyard etiquette; the greenhouse effect of methane emitted collectively by this country’s 10 million cows is equivalent to the CO2 produced by driving one third of a billion miles by car. In response to the problem, researchers at...

An updated version of the all-electric Toyota RAV4 EV, a vehicle that was available to lease in America from 1997 to 2003, is to be developed with help from Tesla. Toyota expects to mass-produce the new car by 2012. Toyota, a company that has gained a reputation for favouring hybrid technology such as that used in its Prius over pure...

The competition between manufacturers to build the fastest electric bicycle can seem purely academic to cyclists in Britain where such machines must be registered as motorcycles in order to be road legal, but the recently-launched, German-designed ‘Blacktrail’ is a fascinating insight into the type of electric-assist bike that might one day...

London’s first distinctive blue cycle lane ‘Superhighways’ opened this week from Merton to the City, and Barking to Tower Gateway. Over 5,000 cycle journeys are already made each day along the routes, but the Superhighways are expected to boost this number to 27,000 cycle trips a day by 2013. What is a Cycle Superhighway? London’s...

An electric robotic exoskeleton that allows wheelchair users to walk and climb stairs unaided went on sale this week and offer an exciting future alternative to electric cars. Electric bionic legs Rex, the Robotic Exoskeleton, is a pair of robotic legs worn outside the body that enables its user to stand up, walk, move sideways, turn...

American inventor, Steve Hunt has designed a bicycle lock that, if tampered with, calls you on your smart phone. The Halo Lock is a wonderfully sleek design, but its ability to alert a cyclist to the fact their bike is being stolen works only in areas served by Wi-Fi. Tracker locks for bicycles A spokesperson for cycle insurers...

The future of personal transport is widely assumed to be electric cars, but if an American inventor currently vying for the James Dyson design award has his way many of us will be sporting motorised shoes. In a world where the default mode of transport is often the car, Treadway Wearable Mobility shoes are designed for short urban trips and...