The e-scooter Boom
& collect
The German Ministry of Transport announced that it will legalize e-scooters as road vehicles. All Germans over the age of 15 will be legally able to ride a scooter up to 12 km/h on roads, bike paths and sidewalks. This also means that insurance coverage will be provided in the event of accidents that may occur between e-scooter drivers, cars and pedestrians.

Children and adults riding on scooters are a common urban scene in European cities. The most active place for the e-scooter business in Europe is Madrid, the capital of Spain. As soon as the European Union legalized the use of scooters in 2016, the Spanish government began to recommend them as an alternative means of transport in large cities in Spain.

At the end of 2018, when an 90-year-old pedestrian was killed by an e-scooter, the Spanish government temporarily ordered a suspension of services such as Lime, Wind and Voi (Sweden). These services have soon been reauthorized, however, e-scooter users must now obey new driving regulations, such as not exceeding a maximum speed of 25 km/h, driving only on roads and bus lanes, and giving pedestrian priority.

Developed countries have long been striving to reduce urban traffic and automobile emissions and to switch to more environmentally friendly means of transport. Therefore the use of bicycles and electric scooters has been encouraged for urban single-person transportation. While the bicycle sharing business is not any more gaining much attention, more e-scooter startups are trying to get a slice of the mobility market.

Uber and Lime have been the first e-scooter sharing service companies to enter the European market. Recently, Bird, run by Google parent company Alphabet, has entered the competition. These companies all aim to expand into the European market based on their success in Los Angeles and San Francisco, which are notorious for heavy traffic. The Ford Motor Company is preparing to enter the urban e-mobility market, and German automaker Volkswagen said it plans to launch its own e-scooter, e-skateboard and e-bike in the near future.

Policymakers in continental European countries are generally responsive to the popularization of e-scooters. However, many countries still postpone their legalization for safety reasons. Traffic accidents increase when scooters are used on pedestrian sidewalks at speeds of 15-30 km/h. Also a higher rate of car accidents is likely to occur when e-scooters drive on roads.

Chinese companies have entered the European mobility market early on with two e-bike sharing companies, Ofo and Mobike. However, they have been struggling with missing parking and charging facilities, theft, vandalism, and user data breaches, and finally stopped operations.

Can the real problem be solved with e-scooters? Some experts say that e-scooters are the future of mobility. But others criticize that the e-scooter boom is not a long-term solution, but rather a short-term fix for cities struggling to come up with viable solutions to the increasing problems of urban traffic.

Text by Jina Park.
share The e-scooter Boom
penccil.com/gallery.php?show=13263
Tier, Germany's e-scooter-sharing company, uses scooters with small wheels which make them maneuverable, but also come with a higher risk of accidents. Courtesy: Tier Mobility
BirdOne is a new model released on May 8 by Bud, a US-based company. Bud has announced that it will stop purchasing the Ninebot ES model, which has been used for shared rentals, and replace it with 'Bird One' and 'Bird Zero' models. Their price is US $ 1,299. © PRNews Photo
Spin was launched in San Francisco, USA in February 2018. Spin originally started out as a bike-sharing service start-up and was recently acquired by Ford Motor Company. Courtesy: Spin
After the failure of China's Oppo and Mobike, Spain's bicycle sharing service market is currently dominated by Jump (JUMP by Uber, USA). Courtesy: JUMP
The 'Streetmate' urban scooter developed by German maker Volkswagen and Chinese startup Niu. The market launch date is yet to be determined. Courtesy: VW
To use the e-Scooter from Lime, a US-based e-Scooter-sharing company, you'll need a smartphone with the Lime app and a credit card for payment. The scooter model that Lime buys is a Segway-produced Ninebot. Courtesy: Lime.
  Inspirations.  
Typography
Collection of beautiful typography and graphic design.
Digital Biology
Interior studies for public indoor spaces merging digital and biological environments. Wall modules ...
Podchain
Podchain is an integrated design concept for on-demand autonomous transport. To optimize kinetic ene...
Fashion, Food, Transport
FUTURE CITY premiered at Vienna Art Week 2018 on November 20, 2018, at MAK Museum of Applied Arts in...
WRECK--Regeneration Experiment of Wasted Daily-use Ceramics from Chaozhou, China
WRECK, the destruction of decorum, the ruin of culture. BENTU went deep into daily-use ceramics indu...
Time
How do you express time without numbers or watch hands? Clocks abstract time into a measurable, un...
Low cost urban transport
Combining contemporary technology with a focus on low cost and reliability, this neighborhood transp...
AI assistant
With the advance of digitalisation, items which once had a central position in households have disap...
Hybrid urban scooter
A low-cost hybrid urban scooter for developing countries running either on electric battery or on bi...
Omnidirectional Speaker
Sculptural ominidirectional speakers, projecting sound recorded from an omnidirectional microphone i...
Multifunctional tableware
Inspired by the culture, cuisine and hospitality of the ancient silk road, this ceramics series cons...
An organic structure for bikes
A sports bike for urban and mountain environments. The aluminium frame provides for increased stabil...
S tables
modul for table
One Hundred Thousand Games
One Hundred Thousand Games is an online game with unlimited levels. It takes the genre of first-per...
Jerszy Seymour Amateurtopia
Berlin born and –based designer Jerszy Seymour studied engineering at South Bank Polytechnic 1987 ...
Emotibots
Emotibots are shape-shifting social home robots interacting with humans. Robots will in the future i...
Black Box. A Cabinet of Robotic Curiosities
The Vitra Campus has a new exhibition space: in one of the houses at the southern entrance, a Black ...
Flow
Flow simulations on car designs. Surfaces in red show the highest resistance. (C) MGD 2010.
Breathe
The determined breaths of a glassblower are seldom included in the finished product of their labour,...
City Garden II ´Spaces´
Family garden for 5: spacy rooms
Charles Tassin
Interior designer Charles Tassin has developed a very personal approach to decoration. Merging the s...
penccil: This was 2017
The penccil year in review is a project selection for 2017, this year curated by Mario Gagliardi. Se...
Cutting the edges
Arctic Paper launches new swatch books for the brands Arctic, Amber and G-Print, as well as the two ...
Mugs
Intentionally on the very edge of usability, this project takes ubiquitous objects - in this case co...
Functional Pasta
Pasta based on the geometry of a Möbius strip, a geometric surface with the distinction of having o...
We Ar
University of Sunderland MA Glass and Ceramics Show
Coffee maker
Visualization of the process of coffee making. The aim was not to use words.
Mapping Reality
During a walk through Berlin Moabit I sketched my perception of the surrounding streets. The result ...
TYPOGRAPHY
RESEARCH
Green Architecture…. Is it blessing or curse!!
GREEN ARCHITECTURE….IT IS GOOD FOR THE NATURAL WORLD OR MAYBE IT WILL BE A MESS OF THE TREES AND P...
Vico Magistretti
Vico Magistretti (1920 - 2006) studied in Lausanne and Milano. He was one of the main protagonists o...
Franz Kline
Around 1950, Franz Kline radically simplified painting: “Instead of making a sign you can read, yo...
Glowscape
Study for a LED light installation. LED diodes are installed on a net of wires and placed over the l...
Structured Reflection
These 3D-printed vases feature finely faceted surface structures which create intriguing light refle...
Watch UX
A UX study for a smart watch with a digital interface from 2004. (C) Mario Gagliardi
Gaetano Pesce: Abstraction is boring
"Abstraction is boring and limited as a mode of expression. Reducing and reducing designs means that...
Jeff Zimmerman
Jeff Zimmermann is a Chicago based artist. Born in Kentucky, Zimmerman spent his childhood among nat...
klub katarakt 12
klub katarakt, the festival for experimental music, takes place for the twelfth time at Kampnagel, H...
Home Patterns
“Home Patterns” is a new series of patterns by Longstory, designed for printing on textiles, wal...
American Food
Davide Luciano is a New York based conceptual food and beverage photographer and motion artist. His ...
Organic Public
Contemporary cities are in need of public spaces which work better for their citizens. This proposal...
Michael Schoner
Michael Schoner develops 3D and 2D designs in different scales varying from architecture and interio...
Design for Disaster
"A disaster zone where everything is lost offers the perfect opportunity for us to take a fresh look...
Memphis Posters
4 posters by the legendary Italian design collective Memphis Milano.
A Flat Named Desire
An inspirational collection of interior objects.
Kippenberger
Martin Kippenberger (born 1953 in Dortmund, died 1997 in Vienna) is one of the foremost and simultan...
German Art since 1960
German ‘paragons of painting’ such as Georg Baselitz, Jörg Immendorff and Markus Lüpertz have ...
A Summer For The Modernists
"Today every city, town, or village is affected by it. We have entered the Neon Civilization and bec...
Joe Colombo: Total Furnishing Unit
The Total furnishing unit: Bathroom by Joe Colombo, Milano 1971.
Pillars
Consisting of connected bricks whose relative position can be altered by changing underlying paramet...
Inspiration
Things which inspire me https://soundcloud.com/myrne/architect https://vimeo.com/173541384
Carlo Scarpa: Sketch and Work
There is hardly another architect of the 20th century in whose work the progression from sketch to c...
The Bauhaus Revolution
The Bauhaus was the most influential design school of the 20th century. See more in the new magazin...
In Orbit
"When I look at these complex layers of translucent lines and spheres, I am reminded of models of th...
Heartbeat, Heartseat
Heartbeat consists of a massive heart glowing to the rhythm of a strong, deep and low frequency hear...
This City
This City is an audio-visual piece performed as musical alter-ego Mark Eats. It explores what happen...
ЯРОСЛАВ МИСОНЖНИКОВ: ODNOSVECHNIK
ODNOSVECHNIK is a candle holder in marble and wood. Designer Yaroslav Misonzhnikov, born 1988 in ...
The Glass House
"This house was Philip Johnson's autobiography—all of his interests were visible, and all of his a...
20th Century Italian Tables
A collection of 20th century Italian table designs.
The Oily Actor
“I had been looking around these ideas of systemic crisis, global financial crisis, which is what ...
Julius Shulman: Visual Drama
"Julius had an eye for visual drama. With modernist buildings, he loved capturing the strong lines s...
Tea Time
TEA AVE es una marca Canadiense de Tés Oolong. Nos pidieron el desarrollo de la imagen gráfica, la...
The future of traveling - Projects
Project results of the workshop on the future of hospitality, tourism and traveling led by Mario Gag...
Jewelry Design Art
Jewelry Art design pattern inspired from nonlinear dynamics. Drawings collection about fluid flows...
Intuitive Phone
Design futures concepts for a smartphone and a portable music player (2004) by Mario Gagliardi. This...
Computer Vision
Four design concepts by Mario Gagliardi on the possibilities of personal computers, designed and pub...
F zero zero d
Plates decorated with stylized prints of stereotypical food items: a hot dog, a steak, a slice of pi...
Colliding Worlds
Architectural models of small planets appear in unexpected places. (C) Mario Gagliardi 2007
Luigi Colani
Colani studied sculpture and painting at the Academy of Arts, Berlin and aerodynamics at the Sorbonn...
Bracq
Paul Bracq´s career began in the design studio of Philippe Charbonneaux, where he served as Charbon...
also:
Whiskey Bay Press Merc
Merch
Bookcover mockup
book cover design idea
Mario Casa dining chairs
Dining chairs by Mario casa are 100% handcrafted in natural materials. https://mariocasa.it
Mario Casa Pillows
Mario Casa pillows are handstitched and embroidered on fine Raw Silk sourced from a family handloom ...
Mario Casa Carpets
Mario Casa carpets are handcrafted in 100% New Zealand Merino wool. https://mariocasa.it
Mario Casa Tables
Mario Casa coffee tables, side tables and dining tables are 100% handcrafted by our cabinetmakers in...
Mario Casa Lounge Chairs
Lounge chairs by Mario Casa, designed by Mario Gagliardi, are 100% hand-crafted in natural materials...
Printed textures
3D printing has become a viable production method enabling the rapid production of small and medium-...
Candy Morandi
Giorgio Morandi's ceramic vessels have been the inspiration for this project. Morandi´s objects are...
SCARABOOK
SCARABOOK is the combination of Scarabottolo and the English word book (but perhaps we ought to say ...
Haribo Centennial
Haribo, the company behind the bear-shaped fruit-flavored jelly candy from Germany, is 100 years old...
Laurel Hills Residence
A beautiful example of a contemporary Californian residence, designed by Assembledge architects. The...
Los Angeles
Traveling with Google Maps
Spring 2020 - Project 2 - MassArt
A school project in which we had to redesign a small triangle shape park near Harvard Square in Camb...
Objects of Desire
»Surrealism and Design 1924 – Today« 28.09.2019 – 19.01.2020 at Vitra Design Museum Surrealis...
Chromaglass
Chromaglass is a cocktail glass displaying its ingredients through colors. An inner insulating conta...
Nature morte/Nature vivante
Until recently, artists, designers and architects were used to working with inert, non-living materi...
HYFY
HYFY is a project to rethink the functions, structures and formal expressions of audio hardware.
Upcycled
Furniture design from upcycled materials: Stools from old rubber tyres, oil barrels and washing mach...
chair_ONE
chair_ONE is the best known design by Konstantin Grcic, a German furniture designer whose work is eq...
Cazal
Glasses by German manufacturer Cazal were considered a sought-after accessory in New York's hip-hop ...
Reactive Space
Inspired by Plato´s allegory of the cave, this is an architectural study for spaces reacting to its...
Omnidirectional microphone
Design for an omnidirectional microphone, recording sound from all spatial directions. Recorded soun...
Speaker
A sculptural speaker rendered with GLSL signed distance functions. (C) Mario Gagliardi 2018
Rudolf Belling
Rudolf Belling was sculptor, designer, architect and stage designer. In 1908, he founded a studio fo...
Streampal
Streampal is a lifestream robot for Youtubers, Instagrammers and others who want to record passages ...
Fashion 4.0
The fashion industry is on the threshold of a revolution. Global fashion companies ranging from luxu...
The rise of active wear
In the 1920s, legendary tennis player Jean Rene Lacoste invented the tennis shirt, the signature of ...
Private Labels are soaring
On August 1, AP News reported the closing of stores at the New York and Chicago Magnificent Mile sho...
The Dollar Store Trend
Over the past year or two, dollar stores have seen a steep growth in sales, earnings and stock price...
Jonathan Ive leaves Apple
On June 28, Apple´s chief designer Jonathan Ive (born 1967) announced that he would leave Apple lat...
Abstract Form
Click 4 times on the canvas and watch how an abstract form is generated: https://www.mariogagliardi....
Essential Water
In many regions of the planet, water is increasingly becoming rare. Our understanding of water, refl...
The Venice Pavillon
The Venice Pavillon interprets the history of Venice as a point of contact between West and East. Sh...
Generative Botany
An early app for generative graphics, realized in 2000 in the (now deprecated) Adobe Flash. To use t...
Cognition
This experiment looks at the process of human cognition. Letters get progressively filled with color...
Creative Changemakers & Future City
Promotional sites for the initiative Creative Changemakers and the event Future City. (C) 2018 MGD M...
The Persona Project
Social media are powerful because humans use the same parts of the brain to interact with machines a...
Blacker Box
Blacker Box is a design expression for an Intelligent Speaker. (C) Mario Gagliardi Design 2017
Stories of the Future
A generator for news headlines of the future. Every 9 seconds, a new story is generated: http://mar...
Oilspill, Carpet, Camouflage
Pattern generators for interesting surface patterns and backgrounds. Click "Start" to start, "Change...
Alessandro Mendini 1931-2019
For Alchimia, design is a cyle: everything that will have to happen has already happened, and the im...