Honda is moving forward with its Fastport delivery quadcycle, and we got a chance to see it up close and take it for a quick spin.
We told you about Honda’s 4-wheeled delivery vehicle back in June, and we were excited about the idea of right-sizing delivery vehicles in urban centers that are often clogged with car traffic.
To catch you up, it’s a four-wheeled electric cargo vehicle that Honda has been working on for short-range, intra-city deliveries. It has 650lb capacity and a 12mph top speed, with 23 miles of range.
That’s not a huge range number, but we’re talking about cities here – Manhattan is 13×2 miles, San Francisco is 7×7 miles, for example. Also, the 2 x 1.3kWh batteries are 22lbs each and easily swappable if you need a little more juice.
The main concept here is that the vehicle is small, built to fit within the width of a bike lane, and to be treated as one in vehicle regulations. This means you can get cargo around in a smaller package than big delivery trucks, causing less traffic, congestion, road wear, and pollution.
Its presence in the bike lane is the reason for some of those limitations above – EU regulations mean the motor can only go up to 250W continuous draw, which also leads to a 12mph top speed for a vehicle that could be laden with ~1,700lbs of bike, cargo and rider (there is also a “small” version which is narrower and shorter, with 320lb capacity, for smaller roads).
But all that is nice on paper, what’s it like in person?
More in the article.
A slow (12 mph), space-hogging, sharp-cornered, four-wheeled, enclosed vehicle, going down the bike lane and forcing bike riders to overtake in auto traffic. Every once in a while, it will come to a dead stop in the lane, while the driver stands outside in traffic, swings the cargo doors open, then goes off to make a delivery.
Obviously, they thought all this through during the design phase. Which is why they added the fake pedals.