Motorized skateboards have been a kooky outsider vehicle since the late 60′s. They were noisy, expensive, and incapable of handling the precise feats of physical prowess that made human-powered skateboards so popular.
Even though dozens of entrepreneurs attempted their own novel systems for adding a motor to a skateboard, it became a certified outsider vehicle in 1977. That was when California, the state that is otherwise the nucleus of skateboarding culture, enacted a ban on gas-powered skateboards.
They have lain mostly dormant ever since.
Today, however, a confluence of trends has brought motorized skateboards into the mainstream, and entrepreneurs are giving them a try once again.
Thanks to three major factors, motorized skateboards are enjoying a renaissance.
Trend #1: The Popularity of Longboarding
In the simplest terms, a longboard is a skateboard designed for traveling instead of doing tricks. They are significantly longer than a standard skateboard, have a wider wheelbase, and use softer wheels to provide a smoother ride. They come in lots of different shapes and sizes and can carry a slightly larger pricetag than a trick-oriented board.
Over the course of more than a decade, Longboards have grown from an offshoot of skateboarding into a mainstream tool for transportation and recreation.
Now, people who ride longboards aren’t necessarily “skaters” or even athletes. Instead, they run the gamut from students to businesspeople to grandparents. Some of them ride longboards for fun, some for transportation. Either way, there has been a major rise in popularity, and the growth appears sustainable.
Skateboarding goes through boom-and-bust cycles of popularity as its participants age and popularity shifts. In a 2012 interview, Concrete Wave publisher Michael Brooke said he thinks longboarding has the capability to defeat this fad cycle.
“All the surveys I’ve read indicate there is an 85% attrition rate within street skateboarding. Young adults leave it to chase girls, form bands, drive cars and do other nefarious things,” Brooke said. “I sense the reverse is opposite within longboarding. I bet only fifteen percent of people who bought a longboard don’t ride it any more―and they use a longboard to engage in all kinds of nefarious activities!”
This is extremely important because motorized skateboards bear a stronger resemblance to a longboard than to a regular skateboard.
Trend #2 The Growth of E-Vehicles
The Segway blazed a difficult trail for modern electric vehicles. The quirky two-wheeled “human transporter” captivated the world with its technology and innovation back in 2001, but instead of revolutionizing travel, it shrank into a small niche.
While you’re unlikely to see anyone but security guards and tourists riding Segways today, the vehicle served as a daring leader for electric vehicle development.
From 2001 to 2006, more than 16,670 patents were filed for electric propulsion around the world. In the previous five-year span (1995-2000), only 9,034 patents of this type were filed.
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