7. Keys, phone, money ... recharger. Now at last I'm on my way

 

 

Short of following Matthew Parris’s aquatic example and trying to swim it, I have tried just about every method of commuting to work.

But getting from West London to Wapping in East London (0) .On the Tube the Circle Line crawls by a long and tortuous route; the Thames Clipper ferry would be great if I could get on nearer home and if it wasn’t so expensive; (1)  but induces environmental guilt; cycling is perfect in summer, but I’m not sure it will survive long after the first frosts in winter. And Crossrail? Every time it is announced that Crossrail has been given “the final go-ahead,” it seems ever less likely to be finished this millennium.

 

So having ticked off all the other options, I was delighted to discover that I might have entirely legitimate reasons to buy a Vespa. Going on holiday in Italy this summer (2) .What is the difference, I have been trying to convince myself, between riding a scooter along the Palladian avenues of Vicenza and chugging along the Embankment stuck behind a highway maintenance lorry belching its way up and down the red routes of East London?

 

Then I heard about an even better idea: an electric scooter that has the retro good looks of the Piaggio original. It sounded like a win-win: you get to indulge your Italophile vanity while simultaneously boosting your eco-conscience. But there was an obvious snag. As with most people who live in cities, the idea of having to charge the battery by slinging an electric extension cable out on the street from my bedroom window (3) .

 

Step forward the Yogo, the new electric scooter with a removable battery. So instead of running an electric cable to the bike, you simply take out the battery and charge it up at home or at work. In principle, it’s as easy as recharging a mobile phone or a laptop. And as the bike is impossible to drive without its battery, it’s harder to steal.

 

OK, the mobile phone (4) . It’s not quite that easy. The lithium battery, which comes out from below the seat, is the size of a small can of petrol and the weight of a carry-on suitcase. But it really isn’t too heavy to carry easily into work. And you can fit the charger in the Vespa-style box that sits on the back. How far does the Yogo go on one charge? In theory, you can travel up to 22 miles, but it (5) .

 

If your commute is longer than nine miles each way, and you’re too lazy to carry the battery into work each day, there is an alternative: you can have the bike fitted with two batteries, and flip a switch when the first battery runs out. On my first test drive, I managed to use up one battery and was happily surprised that I was able to change over to the second one without too much trouble.

 

And charging the battery doesn’t take long. It takes one hour to completely recharge, but 80 per cent of the charge is delivered in the first half hour. Having recently driven a petrol scooter, this electric one (6) .

 

True, at £2,000 the Yogo isn’t cheap. But it is probably the most environmentally friendly and efficient way anyone has yet devised of getting people to work. I suppose you could also make the argument that it’s much cheaper to charge a battery each day than to use the Tube or drive a car. But there’s a much stronger case. I can’t remember ever arriving at work in a better mood.