The Austrian Times this week reports an increase in the sales of electric bikes. Following the same trend in Germany, industry figures indicated a rise in the number of electric bikes sold, despite a drop in sales of ordinary bicycles in Austria in 2013.
The figures were released by the country’s sporting goods association, the VSSO. In Austria, half of all bicycles are sold by sporting goods retailers. Their figures reveal 1 in 10 bikes sold in Austria last year were electric bikes; the higher price ticket of an e-bike meant the value of overall bike sales remained stable, despite a 7% drop in ordinary cycles sold. As in Germany, increased uptake has been attributed to the nation’s increasingly positive perception of e-bikes. Fred Schierbeck , CEO of bike distributor Thalinger Lange GmbH, explained this meant a move away from the e-bike being solely of benefit to seniors, to a wider ‘rethink on the direction of bicycles as a form of transport’ for all.
Further afield, a port in New Zealand with a population of 42,900, has moved their posties over to using electric bikes for their delivery rounds. Timaru’s undulating roads resulted from the town being built around the site of an extinct volcano. After 25 years of battling the town’s hills on a push-bike, postie Susie Brooking says her new e-bike is “amazing to use uphill”.
Closer to home, Madrid is to open its first public electric bike hire service from 1st May. The announcement follows the success of a similar scheme in Barcelona. The first phase of the scheme will see 1,500 electric bikes made available in the city, with Spanish firm BonoPark benefiting from the contract to supply the parking stands, install the bikes and manage the service. The hire service is part of traffic management scheme, reportedly costing 884 million Euros in total, which is also tasked with creating 37 miles of cycle lanes in Madrid.
