Associate Professor Chris Rissel, from Sydney University’s School of Public Health, has called for laws making the wearing of bike helmets compulsory to be repealed, to encourage more people to ride bikes. Professor Rissel says that the greatest drop in head injuries was in the 80s – before the laws were introduced – because of road safety campaigns and speed controls. He says the number of head injuries has remained steady since then.

The call to repeal the mandatory helmet laws follows the slow response to the public bike sharing scheme introduced in Melbourne in June. The scheme copied a Montreal programme in which the bikes have been used more than a million times since its introduction in May 2009. The Melbourne scheme is attracting only about 250 users a week although Melbourne has more than double the population of Montreal. Many believe that the poor response is due to Australia’s mandatory bike helmet laws.

Australia, New Zealand and Finland are the only countries in which bike helmets are mandatory for adults but in Finland there no penalty for not wearing a helmet. Israel and Mexico have repealed their bike helmet laws following difficulties with their public bike sharing schemes.

Bicycle New South Wales vice-president Richard Birdsey commented that "At the moment it’s important that we retain the law, but certainly once we see improved riding conditions for people, where the roads become safer, the governments should look at perhaps seeing whether they can be wound back a bit."

Keeping mandatory helmet laws on open roads but abolishng them in parks and designated cycleways would seem like a sensible way forward.

Melbourne Bike Share Station (image by Elekhh via Wikimedia)

Twenty Mitsubishi i-MiEV electric cars have arrived in Melbourne to be part of a $5 million electric vehicle trial by the Victorian Government.

Victrian Premier John Brumby said “We are committed to making this state an electric vehicle friendly location and we understand how important cleaner, greener and innovative travel options are to Victorians. That’s why the Victorian Government is currently working with the RACV to find around 180 households interested in taking part in an electric vehicle trial. The successful applicants will get an electric car for three months and we look forward to Mitsubishi being part of that trial. This world-leading trial will create real conditions by testing how drivers, vehicles, plug-in charging infrastructure and the electricity network will interact in real-life situations.”

The five-year electric vehicle trial is part of the $38 billion Victorian Transport Plan to find new ways of making electric cars more efficient and practical for Victorian families and roads. The trial will include passenger cars, light commercial vehicles and electric two-wheelers. There are plans for around 180 charging points and 60 vehicles which will rotate between different households and fleets,

A futuristic electric taxi known as the Unicab is seen as a leading contender to replace New York’s fleet of 26,500 yellow cabs over a ten year period beginning in 2013.

The design is based on a concept from Melbourne’s award-winning RMIT student designer Damian Lucaciu. It incorporates ideas from clean-air experts and the NSW Disability Council’s founder Jacob Baldwin.

It boasts open space, low floors, a ramp for the disabled and seats for up to seven passengers.

Melbourne now has a bike share scheme. Cyclists can pick up or drop off the bikes at one of ten docking stations around the CBD. Another 40 stations and 500 bikes will be added by the middle of next year.

Roads Minister, Tim Pallas, says that "We would expect that a docking station would be no further away than 300 – 500 metres within the CBD grid."

The scheme has cost $5.5 million to set up. Cyclists will pay a membership fee of $2.50 a day, or $8 a week, plus an hourly rate. They will have to provide their own helmet.

Cyclists travelling to one of Central Australia’s popular tourist spots will now be pedalling on a path made from recycled printer cartridges.

The Northern Territory Government has spent $130,000 upgrading the Simpsons Gap bike path.

(Photo of Northern Territory Environment Minister, Karl Hampton, on the new path via ABC)

Australia’s first public on-street electric vehicle charging station has been opened in Derby Place, Glebe. It uses 100 per cent GreenPower from Origin.

The station was installed by Visionstream and is managed by ChargePoint. It will be available to customers of the GoGet car rental company which has a converted plug-in hybrid Toyota Prius. The car has an electric motor range of 30 kilometres, 2 kilometres longer than 80 per cent of GoGet trips and can be recharged in three hours.

Sydney’s Lord Mayor Clover Moore said "I made a commitment last November at a climate change summit in Copenhagen that we would accelerate the introduction of electrical vehicles into Sydney and that we would deploy our first charging station in 2010." The Lord Mayor says she wants Sydney to be ready when electric cars start arriving in 12 to 18 months.

At the U.N. climate change summit, fourteen world cities, including Sydney, vowed to work together over the next year to make their cities more "plug-in ready" for electric vehicles.

The other cities which acmmitted to becoming ready for electric vehicles are Los Angeles, Chicago, Houston, Toronto, London, Mexico City, Hong Kong, Bogota, Buenos Aires, Sao Paolo, Delhi, Seoul and Copenhagen.

Sydney Lord Mayor Clover Moore said Sydney will fast-track the uptake of electric vehicles by establishing charging stations and converting car fleets. She said the City of Sydney Council wanted to set up the first public charging stations before the end of next year.

A Sydney company, ChargePoint Australia Pty Ltd, has signed an exclusive agreement with Coulomb Technologies for the supply of electric vehicle charging systems. The systems will be trialled in car parks in Sydney, Melbourne and Perth in the first half of 2010.

Luke Grana, CEO of ChargePoint Australia, said that he expected installations to rapidly multiply around the nation as major car manufacturers release their own pure electric and hybrid vehicles and that they will also soon to be followed by a faster charger for service stations. Home garage systems are still in development.

Chargers located outside the home will work on a pay per use system in which drivers dial a number listed on the charger or otherwise through a smart card which can be topped up online.

Mr Grana said that the average Australian car cost about $10 to drive 100 kilometres while an electric vehicle cost about $2 per 100 kilometres.

Coulomb Techologies was established in 2007 by a group of computer industry entrepreneurs in the Silicon Valley. It is developing ChargePoint systems for the US, Norway, the Netherland and Germany.

Following calls from South Australian Premier Mike Rann to manufacture the Volt electric car in South Australia, General Motors Holden has said that it remains committed to bringing the US-made version to Ausralia in 2012 but it would then consider whether the car would be built in Australia.

The comapany has already taken the first step towards local production with its decision to build the Cruze, which shares its platform with the Volt, in South Australia from next year.

The Holden Cruze replaced the Astra as Holden’s small car offerring in May. It is currently imported from Korea.

The New Zealand Parliament has passed legislation exempting electric cars from road tax.

Previously, electric vehicles were taxed the same as diesel vehicles at between 3.6 and 4 cents per kilometre.

Transport Minister, Steven Joyce, said that combining highly efficient electric motors with New Zealand’s competitive advantage in renewable electricity generation would reduce the greenhouse gases produced by the transport sector.

The new legislation will come into effect on October 1 and continue until 2013 when it will be reassessed.