While pocketbikes (the miniscooters and tiny motorcycles sold at auto parts stores and in gas station parking lots) are theoretically illegal on public roads anyway, the State–er, Commonwealth–of Virginia has banned their use on all public roads. Such bikes are almost universally ridden (helmetless, even) by children and teenagers and cheaply made with little provision for safety or reliability. Hopefully more states will follow their lead, or enforce existing laws. The ban will not affect street-legal, titled and plated motorscooters operated by licensed drivers. Google News usually lists a couple stories a day regarding deaths and serious injuries of children as young as eight, there’s no reason people, especially children, should be riding these deathtraps in traffic.
Category: Scooter Kids!
Galewood 2K6 Update
We’ve updated the Saturday Galewood schedule. In short, meet at Rutherford-Sayre Park (Oak Park Ave @ Shakespeare Ave) for Kickball at 1pm Saturday, and Moe is having a scooter garage sale/impromptu swap meet at 1848 N. Nordica at 4:00, then the BBQ starts at 5:00 with judging at 6:00. Complete details can be found here. (Update to update: there will also be Chicco Scooter races at the BBQ, so if you have a toddler and a Chicco scooter, bring ’em.)
Hell’z Moppet scooter gang terrorizes Ottawa suburbs
A group of 20-30 scooter riding teenagers are on a rampage in Gatineau, Quebec. Police (this is Canada, remember) ask “are they just misunderstood?” (note: hellzmoppet.com is available)
Scooter baby Bonanza
BIG congratulations to scooterists Chrissy and Jeff Hyatt of Atlanta on their new baby girl, born last week (sorry, I forgot to post it), and also Pam Anderson and Daniel Rieke of Denver, whose baby girl (5lbs 5oz, 18 inches) was born this afternoon. Those are going to be two of the coolest babies that ever existed.
Honda UK’s “My First License”
In another example of how the British motorcycle industry kicks the American motorcycle industry’s ass, Honda UK is offering “license classes”? for 5-11-year olds at local bike shows. The licenses aren’t valid, of course, but the program delivers a message about safety and responsibility to british kids (along with Honda’s sales message) at an age when their American counterparts are riding dirt bikes without helmets on their uncle’s farm.
Honda UK’s “My First License”
In another example of how the British motorcycle industry kicks the American motorcycle industry’s ass, Honda UK is offering “license classesâ€? for 5-11-year olds at local bike shows. The licenses aren’t valid, of course, but the program delivers a message about safety and responsibility to british kids (along with Honda’s sales message) at an age when their American counterparts are riding dirt bikes without helmets on their uncle’s farm.
Progressive publishes motorcycle accident/theft stats
Last month, Progressive Insurance published a list of collision and theft statistics for 89 metropolitan areas. Chicago surprisingly placed slightly below the national average on both charts, 64th (of 89) “most likely” for collision, and 52nd (of 89) for theft. Just don’t let your bike out of your site in Honolulu, where theft is 4.28 times more likely than the national average. Thanks for the tip, Vespaway.
??????? (Lovino town)
To celebrate our discovery of Scoot2Go, we will help ourselves to one of Rob’s links: Yamaha’s ??????? (Lovino town), an animated series designed to hype the Vino to its target market: six-year-old Japanese girls. Crazy!
Mod*mom
Townsend Kids’ Vespa shirt
If you’re into scooters, skateboarding, rock and roll, and heavily-branded sportswear, and have kids, check out Townsend kid’s clothing; their mod Vespa shirt is on sale right now. That reminds me, they sell Hurley kid’s shirts at Costco:
Vina: “We should get this for Liam“
Bryan: “He doesn’t even know what Hurley is.”
Vina: “Just tell him it’s a skateboard shirt”
Bryan: “I don’t think Hurley even makes skateboards, they just make shirts.”
Thanks for the link, M5.
Modette Rod
Milena at Culvers modeling her sweet new shirt from The Scooter Scoop. I shoulda got a 4T, she’s growing fast. The monster sort of looks like Dave McCabe.
Chicco Scooter Club
Been meaning to post this for a while… Becky put Milena’s photos up on the Chicco Scooter Club site. In other Chicco news, Milena backed it into the living room door and busted out a turn signal. Her (Indiana!) license plate fell off a week before that. I keep telling her to fix it, but she keeps riding it, when she gets a ticket, I’m totally not paying it.
Scooter Scoop Mod Rod
Steve Guzman’s Scooter Scoop is one of my favorite scooter blogs, so in the absence of me having anything to sell you, check out his cool “Mod Rod” T-shirts. I just ordered one for Milena.
Peg Perego Vespa GT
Peg Perego unveiled a new rechargeable-battery-powered Vespa Granturismo at the American International Toy Fair in NYC this week. We’ll keep an eye out and let you know when we see them for sale. Last night Milena backed her Chicco Vespa into a door and busted out the rear right turn signal, so she’s going to have to learn to ride more responsibly if she wants a GT. Thanks for the link, Vespaquest (See, I’m stealing links already!)
Paper Lambretta
I’ve been waiting ages to post this, even though I can’t remember who sent it to me, and probably everyone’s already seen it. Here’s an NSU Lambretta LD paper model you can print out and assemble. I assume it’s from an old German magazine. If you assemble it, send us a photo!
