There is a good reason for that. In September, I was being asked, if I wish to rent a small shop at Oporto seaside. A shop, where I left my vCard some weeks ago and forgot about it, because I was not really expecting any feedback. But then – all over sudden – the owner contacted me. The rest is already part of history, we agreed upon the renting and I took a closer look on the surrounding of my new place…

I wasn´t aware of the ideal position, it has. It is located at the main cycle lane, directly at the seaside in a recreation and nightlife area at Foz do Douro. Thousands of people (and potential customers) are passing there every day, and on the weekend it will be even more. Not to forget about the thousands of car drivers, who are stacked in the traffic jam, every Saturday and Sunday afternoon, like an always repeating procession throughout the year.

We were discussing in the company the need for a showroom already for a long time, but we always ended up with the conclusion that we might need it, but we will not have the time to promote it. After this new opportunity came up, we had to realize:

That place is the solution we were looking for, without knowing that it already exists.

The area itself was until August 2010 one of the ugliest short links to pass the old centre of Foz do Douro the fast way. No parking area, no cycle lane, a two lane inner-city road without any beauty (beside the sea view). You can still see it on the old Google Street View recording. Meanwhile it was transformed into a ONE WAY lane with parking areas, cycle lane and a pedestrian crossing directly in front of the shop. Take a look on the actual situation here.

Conclusion: There came up a lot of unexpected work on top of the schedule we already had: To start our distribution for Germany´s top cycle brand Kalkhoff and some other accessory brands, that we contacted on Eurobike, like Busch und Müller and Speedlifter for. ex. That made me stop any social network activity, I was just glad to continue some postings on Facebook. But don´t worry, I will not continue where I ended in September and bore you with Eurobike re-views.

There are others, who made this work for me in a very professional and extended way, so please take o look at the article in the famous blog of our good friend Henry Cutler from Workcycles, Amsterdam. What his professional eye registererd on the fair represents exactly the subjects, I would have mentioned. Even when I do not always share his opinion (especially concerning the weight and the handling of modern cargobikes.. I recommend his blog-post and his pictures on Flickr) Well done Henry, I should consider sending him again next year…

Another subject, concerning our blog:

Many people asked me about the future and the target of Lisbonize.com. I initially started this blog to keep people from abroad in touch with Portuguese UrbanMobility. I was asked to do this in Portuguese language, but I refused. There are meanwhile a lot of other quality blogs in Portuguese language, as for ex. LisbonCycleChic so that I will continue my target, to keep the non-Portuguese speaking community in touch with our developing country on the edge of Europe in English language.

People from Portugal are always invited to follow us, the information we are spreading is mainly orientated on national subjects – with the small,  little difference, that our main language will be English. Any guest authors, who wish to publish on our blog in Portuguese are welcome to join us. Just register as a user and I will give you publisher rights to start over!

What happened?

Apart from working end developing E-Mobility.pt as a reliable brand for electric bicycles, cargo- and commuter bikes in Portugal, we used our bikes a lot for pleasure (see illustration on the left-hand side) and for demonstration purposes.

We organized several presentations and let people try the difference of well-engineered bicycle solutions for daily use.

The Cargobix.com product range:

We tested the first Yuba Mundo bicycle that came to Portugal via USED-HQ from Germany. (We decided to have an own retail brand apart from being distributor for other brands - no brand development, no B2B, just selling a good product)

A first client was found immediately, (convinced by me – driving his family around..) others had already an eye on that multi-purpose bike from the US. Recently we delivered two bikes in the city area of Porto – we just banded them on the back of the Yuba.. Great cinema!

Like this, the Yuba Mundo – in it´s new version 3.0 – fits fine into our product range of sophisticated cargo bikes, that we already brought to this market. It was a quite logic decision to complete our bandwidth in that direction. It is affordable, has a reasonable weight and an enormous max. load. (up to 300 kg)

After the Gazelle Cabby - a more lightweight and stylish alternative to the old-fashioned and heavy “bakfiets” from Holland – we brought the Bullitt from Denmark, the fastest cargo bike in t he world – Tokyo CMWC championship winner 2009 – a frame made of aluminium and a steering and brakesystem – that – apart from winning races  serves for hauls of more than 200 kg.

To line up with standard dimension cargo bikes for daily use, we introduced the Heavy-Duty range from Gazelle and the stylish UrbanCargo from Bionicon.  Finally for people who are looking for a three-wheel solution, we have the Winther Kangaroo in the industrial version, a trike with the best and smoothest steering system available on the market. Made out of lightweight and durable aluminum as well, designed by the famous Bullitt designers. For us, a cargo bike should carry a load – but not it´s own weight, therefore (and for other reasons) we considered the brands above mentioned.

The Transformer arrived!

A mobile music unit with a set of 2 high-end amplifiers  to be used as a PA on bicycles – yes! That was a dream and will be a tool for our events in 2011.

2 x 600 W in a Kenwood active system, 12 V supply, powered by high-capacity batteries and mounted on our E-Bullitt with the famous BionX HT-Engine is a unique reference for this kind of equipment in combination with a cargo bike. The Bullitt carries 250 Kg and it is still “rideable” in an acceptable way. We had not yet the time to promote this fantastic toy in the way it deserves, but you may count with a “bang” in 2011! ..for sure…

Some impressions are already on Facebook…

E-Mobility in Portugal…

..will be one of the hottest issues in 2011 – as it already is in the rest of Europe ! Means: 20% increase effect on the bike market in Germany and other countries. What product brought this effect before? The re-creation of the wheel..

Therefore we decided to go for the distribution of the German market leader in that product area – the company Kalkhoff (Derby-Cycle Group) a company with a more than 90 year-old experience in bicycle manufacturing situated in Cloppenburg/Germany.

E-Bikes “Made in Germany”, based on three propulsion concepts:

The Panasonic center engine, the Panasonic front engine and finally the BionX rear engine in specially adapted bicycles, each designed for it´s purpose.

..and finally:

EUROBIKE 2011!

I am already on the departure, therefore this post will be continued on Saturday when the fair is over..!

Anyway, we thought what is good for Royals can not not even be good enough for us and so we ordered a Gazelle Miss Grace, the noble and stylish derivative of the Gazelle NL Heavy Duty. We brought the bike to our exhibition “Mobilidade Urbana” that is currently running in OPorto at Belomonte20 Gallery. When arriving, I left the bike outside the gallery to attract people and to make them curious to step inside. That was the best we could do, a lot of people stopped, saw the bike, came to see the exhibition and we had “Full-House”.

Even a Dutch couple came in to have a look on bicycles from the Netherlands - 2.800 km away from home. (Do they suffer, the Dutch people, when they don´t see any bicycles longer than one week..?

But they were very interested and they noticed our little project and appreciated much to learn about activities of Urban Mobility community that are actually happening in Portugal. When I told them, that we started our business inspired by a visit of Amsterdam in 2008, they were happy!

BTW: Our exhibition will continue until 15 of May, we are changing from week to week some pieces and we are planning different activities. On 25 of April I will meet the people from “Movimento Alternativo” and check out, if some of them are interested to visit our place on the day of their annual meeting. Next Friday (30. April) I will join “Massa Crítica” in OPorto, to invite them as well.

At least some actual picture od street-working “Miss Grace”:

I met two exhausted heroes, dropping just in after one week of organisation and participation at Greifmasters Bikepolo.

Recep and Holger started their biz in 2004 and they did it right from “zero”. In the beginning they were the “bad boys” – being chased away from the fairground when promoting their bikes in a ”guerrilla-way” Meanwhile they are the proud holders of a Eurobike award and several design awards around the world. They turned their company from a garage story to an established brand in the bicycle market. When I was visiting them last week they proudly presented their new warehouse which sets up another milestone in logistic capability. We agreed upon an individual strategy for the Portuguese market, to allow the brand to grow as well in Southern Europe. Meanwhile we´ve got 4 dealers in the Lisbon area and we are looking for more enthusiastic entrepreneurs who are visionary enough to invest in UrbanMobility with style.. [*Marketing mode "OFF"]

OK, this post should have been written in the beginning, but creativity not always appears on demand…

In August 2008 I visited Amsterdam and was impressed by the perfect integration of bicycles and other alternative vehicles in the city structure. Comparing that with the conditions in Portuguese cities (and some others for ex. in Spain) there is missing a decade of development in nearly everything:

Road conditions, bicycle lanes, legislation, car domination and so on…

But on top of all this comes the new and already practised Community-legislation concerning CO2-output and noise pollution.

This will cause an immediate reaction of the city-majors and result in rigorous closing and banning of individual (car-) traffic from the city-centers.

So all this lead to my “URBAN MOBILITY”-Project, that I started in Autumn 2008.

My target, is to collect the already existing knowledge of alternative traffic solutions and make it suitable and feasible for the special Portuguese conditions. To offer traffic solutions to the cities, to develop e-powered vehicles and support their distribution to final customers and for. ex. enterprises and their employees.

For sure, we don’t do this as “Holy Samaritans” but before making money with that, we have to do a lot of basic work. For. ex. to bring together the knowledge of traffic-developers, bicycle-producers and alternative energy fabricators!

This platform on Blogger (edit: meanwhile WorPress) could be part of a movement that is about to start on the beautiful edge of Europe:

Portugal

Who wants to be part of it, join us!

First Steps so far:

December 08:
E-MOBILITY-SYSTEMS.COM, Lda. was set up as a company, to bring together all options of mobility solutions for bigger cities in Portugal.

January 09:
We started with an E-bike project in Porto to show (and commercialize) already available alternative vehicles.

This includes the use of fold-able electric bicycles and the introduction of a lightweight e-powered cargo bike.

During November 08 till January 09:
We already gathered some experience with the cargo bike of a famous Dutch bike-brand.