Nomads need electricity
Saw something interesting the other day: A handful of folks gathered under the portico of Vancouver’s central library around an electrical outlet charging their electric bikes. That got me to thinking: nomads need electricity.
Now, of course, in this day and age we already know this. But I suspect most of us who are thinking of on-the-go electrical needs are thinking of electricity for devices (you know: laptops, phones, and so on). That’s certainly an important question. But E-bikes are becoming an important part of the transportation spectrum and they can’t bring them into coffee shops and libraries to get them charged. And, in addition, coffee shops aren’t exactly free electricity anyway. You have to buy something to sit there.
So, that brings me to the puzzle of finding free or near-free, outside public electricity access for E-bikes. Is there some kind of wiki/blog/list where somebody is keeping track of outdoor plugs? Is it in this Yahoo Group? It would seem to be a good idea to maintain a list somewhere. I’m not tapped into the e-bike community at all so I don’t know.
As an example: people are tracking power in airports and there’s plenty of public wifi lists (here’s one) so I suspect the e-bike community trades this info somehow.
Of Course, if the idea catches a public-buzz, then somebody will definitely try to commercialize it so I suppose one should be careful what one wishes for.
