![](https://techcrunch.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/09/Erik-Buell-CTO.jpg?w=600)
The US perhaps be the land of the car, with its grid-oriented cities, wide roads and highways rolling towards the horizon. But cities not built for cars have narrow, winding, and possibly cobbled streets without much parking, and you’ll find that mopeds and bicycles with small engines are much more common than cars in these cities. They are cheap to run, easy to maintain and relatively easy to learn to drive. Usually they are not about recreation, but about transportation and business.
When I lived in London, a motorcycle was my primary mode of transportation. I zipped through Hanoi on a moped. Bangkok, Fes, Paris, Rome: they are full of mopeds and motorcycles. But what will happen to this mode of transport when we switch from combustion engines to electrification?
I spoke with motorcycle legend Erik Buell to get his take on what the future holds. Buell, motorcycle racing champion, engineer and founder of the Buell Motorcycle Company, is helping the Fuell company envision the future, including the recently launched $10,695 Fuell Fllow.
Above: Erik Buell on the Fuell Flow.
The future of mopeds and motorcycles is electric, says Buell. In fact, he sees mopeds and motorcycles playing an even bigger role in transportation in general.
“A bunch of mayors from cities across Europe are standing up and saying they are going to ban internal combustion in their cities,” says Buell, highlighting what is driving this change. “It won’t happen next year, but it will happen soon.”
In Paris, home to at least half a million mopeds and motorcycles, daily parking fees are now charged for two-wheeled vehicles with engines. But not electric. So when it comes to electrifying motorcycles, light middleweight or moped vehicles are the obvious starting point for Buell.
But that’s not just because of the large number of people who use them every day and how important they are in keeping entire cities moving.