EUROPEAN cities and their bike riding culture has inspired Julian Ilich to want to bring the same to Western Australia.
Tiller Rides was founded in Fremantle and set out to design an urban bicycle that the everyday person could use.
Mr Ilich said he had always ridden bikes but sometimes it could be a logistical nightmare.
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READ NOW“You have make to sure you have your lock, make sure your lights are charged and have patches to fix your tyres,” he said.
“If you look at other places in the world they walk or cycle rather than use cars, if you want to get people you have to make cycling easier.
“Living just outside of Freo I realise how painful bike riding could be, I started to look for a bike with features built in but it didn’t exist.”
Mr Ilich said they didn’t set out to create an e-bike but somehow that’s what happened.
“It turns out people ride a lot more if you make it easier for them and so they don’t get sweaty,” he said.
“Our locks are built in and can tether to something, it also has an alarm system that is motioned based, it will give a couple of warnings then the alarm will sound.
“A text message will be sent and it will initialise GPS, the motor will shut itself down so it won’t be a usable bike.
“To sell the bike to your friend you have to transfer ownership like a car, it is part of the five part anti-theft system.”
The bike also features built in lights which are charged by two battery packs and turn on automatically.
Mr Ilich said he wanted to contribute to more sustainable cities.
“In five years I hope to have pumped out our millionth e-bike,” he said.
“People won’t re-imagine a city until they can see how they would work in the city if it wasn’t car dominated.
“We are doing something that is well beyond what is happening in the world anywhere.”
The first edition Tiller Rides is available for pre-order.
For more information head to https://www.tillerrides.com/