PRECIS: THE LOST HISTORY OF THE ELECTRIC CAR & WHAT IT TELLS US ABOUT THE FUTURE OF TRANSPORT
An edited extract By Tom Standage, from A Brief History of Motion: From the wheel to the car to what comes next, published by Bloomsbury
To every age dogged with pollution, accidents and congestion, the transport solution for the next generation seems obvious – but the same problems keep coming back. Tom Standage, through this edited extract, analyses the history of the electric car and explores it’s real message about the futuristic means of transport.
From the 1800’s application of horse drawn vehicles to today’s use of cars, the advancement of vehicle technology has only been a “quick fix” for the problems of the time. Pollution, accidents, and congestion have been issues that our world has faced over the years, but has pragmatically gotten worse. They’ve led up to the biggest issue we are facing right now – climate change. While people are trying to come up with solutions for this foreseeable danger, it’s been a problem that has been lingering since before the start of the automobile ages.
Many inventors have already started to come up with inventions that might help lessen the impacts of global warming, such as electric cars. However, Standage through his article quotes ‘History suggests that it would be naive to assume that switching from one form of propulsion to another would mean things would otherwise continue as they were; that is not what happened when cars replaced horse-drawn vehicles. However, some people say it’s time to rethink not just the propulsion technology that powers cars, but the whole idea of car ownership.’ Simply put, we should learn from our past, and instead of creating more ‘ideal solutions’ that will only push the issue further back, we should create inventions that help solve the real problem itself.
‘The future of transport’, as Standage quotes, ‘will not be based on a single technology, but on a diverse mixture of transport systems, knitted together by smartphone technology.’ Instead, collectively, ride hailing, micro mobility and on-demand car rental offer new approaches to transport that provide the convenience of a private car without the need to own one, for a growing fraction of journeys. While still serving the needs of today’s growing society, this proposition provides cheaper, quicker, cleaner and more convenient alternatives that will slowly chip away at the rationale for mass car ownership, consequently dealing with the issue of climate change.
In conclusion, Standage’s discussion focuses on how transport has advanced since the 19th century, and the problems we have faced and are continuing to face because of this transformation. He persuades us to address the real issue at hand – climate change – and provides a possible solution on how to stop the loop of propulsion technology.
ORIGINAL ARTICLE: https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2021/aug/03/lost-history-electric-car-future-transport