Frogger

The Korea Times reports that the metropolitan government is seeking to replace Seoul's noisy, pollutant-spewing scooters with "eco-friendly electronic motorbikes." 

The 50,000 gasoline-powered scooters that currently tool around Seoul are favored by Chinese food deliverymen, pizza deliverymen, Kyochon chicken deliverymen, locksmiths who come to your door, appliance repairmen, emergency roadside service, families of four that cannot afford cars, pimps taxiing "coffee girls," high school students who illegally drive to school instead of walking or taking public transport, low-rent biker gangs, fuel deliverymen, and insomniacs who try to deal with their disorder by boisterously taking to the streets and sharing their condition with the sleeping masses. 

The facts are these: The tens of thousands of scooters with 50-cc engines each produce far more carbon monoxide and hydrocarbons than cars with engines of 1500 cc. Eight times more carbon monoxide and 140 times more hydrocarbons from their inefficient engines. 

The idea is to get the 30,000 used commercially off the roads, thus reducing atmospheric pollution and noise pollution. An electronic scooter can travel 40 kilometers—traveling up to 50 kph—on a four-hour charge, which costs only 3.2% the cost of gasoline for a gasoline-powered motorbike. For short distances to and from a commercial establishment, this should be no problem. If you're planning to travel across the country, that's another story.

These bikes currently cost 3 million won, more than double the cost of a gasoline-powered bike, but the electric bike cost could go down as mass production goes forward. In the meantime, the fuel savings should offset much of the higher price. The government could also try subsidizing the bikes, since they represent a social benefit that is worth the cost of the subsidy. 

I want to go on record, though, saying this is a terrible idea. I predict a massive death toll as these silent killers mow down unsuspecting pedestrians strolling unsuspectingly down Seoul sidewalks, unaware that they are in the path of a reckless and physics-impaired deliveryman who places no value on human life—not his own and certainly not yours.

With noisy motorbikes, at least the pedestrian who finds himself an involuntary contestant in a death match of sidewalk Frogger™ can use the cacophonous rattling of an inefficient motorbike as a warning to get the hell out of the way, or at least to get right with God before being plowed into. With these eco-friendly electric bikes, we shall see day after day of headlines announcing the latest case of pedestrian pancakes.