This can't be the answer, since it doesn't explain the huge explosion in non-bike forms of electric transportations.
From scooters to electric skateboards to hoverboards to a number of single-wheeled designs. These things are absolutely ubiquitous in any major city, US or Europe, right now.
These all fit in the same practical niche as a Segway, yet are cheaper and cooler-looking.
All of these pay as you go scooter services solved the cost problem and are everywhere now, in exactly the same niche that Dean Kamen envisioned, minus cities redesigning themselves around scooters of course.
These also use the existing car infrastructure (as they're usually 6-10 passengers drinking + the driver (who stays sober for obvious reasons) and thus about the same size as a transit van), no specialised bike infrastructure is required.
- Massive and sustained increase in cycle routes (also applicable to ebikes, scooters, etc.), especially fully segregated from traffic and pedestrians, and including redesigning some major junctions and transport hubs
- Actual changes in law to allow e-scooters (initially via hire schemes) as well as police generally turning a blind eye to technically illegal personal e-scooters/and electric skateboards
- Conversion of parking spaces to cycle racks, resident's cycle storage huts, and ebike/scooter drop-off points
- City run cycle hire services and docking infrastructure as well as widespread app based services
- Closing many residential streets to through traffic, allowing only local traffic (almost none) and pedestrians, cycles, scooters, skateboards (seriously, this is amazing, streets are super quiet and I can get around my local area by bike or electric scooter/skateboard quickly and incredibly safely)
- Requiring cycle parking and storage in new residential and office developments
- Increasing of congestions/pollution charging
And when I travel around Europe, though I don't know as many of the specifics, it feels likely many cities are at least as advanced as London, quite likely moreso in many cases. The US… not so much.
One thing I had completely forgotten is how mediocre the specs were on the first generation Segways. Top speed of 17mph, but realistically more like 12. Range: up to 17 miles. Charge time: 10 hours. MSRP: $4,500.
This is also one of those rare consumer products with dubious distinction of killing its own creator.
Exactly. When I first saw them I thought that they look like fun. When I saw the prices, I decided that the fun can wait.
It did solve a real problem, it just did so badly - it was heavy, expensive, clunky, and had no suspension so could not handle much surface imperfection.
I think Kamen's big mistake was that he was pathologically afraid of anything smacking of speed, competition, or plain fun. He explicitly worked to avoid any association or possible diversion of use of the Segway in anything like that, because he thought a key audience was city planners who hated skateboards, and thus any fun at all would result in them being banned from city use. Maybe he's right, but if so, the solution space was zero.
Yet, that total avoidance of fun resulted in a number of disasterous results. First, as PG pointed out, the users all looked like dorks - because they were riding a device designed only for dorks.
This also resulted in zero engineering being dedicated to performance, and the, IMO, insane decision to have no suspension. This resulted in the spectacle of President Bush falling off one on his very public ride, simply from riding over a very small hole. Another very public black eye.
and the general absolutely clunky engineering of the thing resulted in no fun, no enthusiasm, and the only real use case being the mall cop market. And a few isolated groups playing Segway Polo is not exactly an activity to generate enthusiasm.
I'm quite convinced that if he'd engineered the thing to be fun, or at least hackable to be fun, it would have taken off. It would have been much more streamlined, cool looking higher performance, and with a suspension to be able to handle at least a bit of terrain (heck even 2" of travel would have made a huge difference). It would not have been that hard to add a "Calm Zone Mode" akin to phone's Airplane Mode for use in the city...
But, that's all history now
These have all declined a lot from our view in Southern California, seeing a lot fewer of them after the peak in... 2018 was it?
Electric bikes are still increasing slowly but surely every year as the price comes down.
Ubiquitous is doing a lot of work there. In the Northeast US, I've probably seen an increase in bikes given some dedicated bike lanes but I rarely see anything else.