Skate of the art – An Irishman’s Diary about futuristic transport

I was in a Dublin city-centre supermarket the other night when a strange vision unfolded before me. A young man of Nordic appearance glided past on a small, automated platform with flashing lights. It looked like the lovechild of an affair between a Segway and a skateboard.

But while I was marvelling, another young man – very un-Nordic, with a hipster beard and a ring through his nasal septum – greeted the first, leading to the following exchange, which I report verbatim.

Hipster: Hey, man! Nordic type: Hey! Hipster (pointing down, fascinated): Where did you get that? Nordic type (in matter-of-fact tone): From the future. Hipster (smiling): Really? Nordic type (unsmiling): You know – the shop in Aungier Street. Hipster: Oh, you’re serious!

Aungier Street is not a part of Dublin I associate with the future, normally. Were time-travellers looking for a place to land, they probably wouldn’t go there – if only because, when asking directions, they might not realise that Dubliners pronounce “Aungier” to rhyme with “danger”. As a result, they’d probably be sent to Ongar, a housing estate near Blanchardstown, instead.

But as I’ve since realised, the shop’s full name is “Back from the Future”. And it is indeed in the street that rhymes with danger.

Which may be apt because, when I asked the Nordic type how fast his unusual transport could go, he told me 20 miles an hour.

Of course, we agreed, such a speed would be unlikely – and inadvisable – in central Dublin. The auto-skateboard may have the same self-balancing technology as the Segway (“It’s a Segway without a stick, basically”, he confirmed). But never mind the crowds, the city’s lunar surfaces might be too much for it.

Anyway, unless it was a souped-up model, he may have been overestimating it. The ones I’ve since read about seem to have a top speed of 10kph. And Back from the Future doesn’t actually stock them yet, although they’ll order if asked.

I suspect these things could become popular – more so that the original Segways, at least, which in my view never recovered from looking like rogue lawnmowers that have run away with their owners.

There was also the fact that, soon after they first appeared, the then US president (George W) managed to fall off one publicly.

And although it emerged that the gyroscopic technology was blameless – the eejit had forgotten to switch it on – the mishap still suggested the machine was not idiot proof.

Anyway, as I watched the young man glide away on his stick-less version the other night, it did look rather stylish. I was tempted to get one myself.

Like Jonathan Richman (circa 1976), I’m in love with the modern world. Sometimes anyway, although my most revolutionary forms of transport, for now, are membership of a car-sharing scheme and two Dublin bike rental cards.

The stereo bike rental, and the related phone app, come into their own every morning, during the grim struggle to get my laggard teenage son to school on time. There’s a 40-bike station at the end of our road. But it’s always touch-and-go as to whether there’ll be any bikes left when the teenager finally gets his stuff together.

So after he finds his shirt and tie at, say, 8.20am, I can check from the comfort of my breakfast table, via the phone, how many bikes are left (about 20 usually). And when he finds his socks, I’ll check again (it’s probably down to 15 then).

But if the number is in single figures as the search for his shoes begins, it’s time to act. I sprint down to the station and get two bikes. Then I wheel them back and accompany the prisoner to school, so he doesn’t find other ways to be late en route.

I wonder if we’ll ever see Dublin City Council operating a free-rental automated skateboard scheme. It would happen in Paris first, I suppose. And even then, the aforementioned pavement issue, and fear of compensation claims, might prevent adoption here.

It was sobering, soon after my vision of the future, to read that court report about the woman who broke her ankle in a pothole after having 10 pints at a party in Dublin’s Tel-el-Kebir football club.

I’m glad the parties reached a settlement. But as this very un-futuristic incident – the club is named after a battle in Egypt in 1882 – reminds us, there are still some very basic transport challenges facing humanity. One of the most urgent is be to find a human self-balancing technology that can cope with 10 pints.

@FrankmcnallyIT